Stand-To

CHAPTER 5

There were fifty-two merchant ships in the first convoy to leave the shores of the United States enroute for Europe, all were carrying war stocks and the 1^st (US) Armoured Division. To escort this irreplaceable cargo eastward, NATO had assigned a carrier battle group, led by the Nimitz class carrier USS Gerald Ford.

It was an all US effort and included two Los Angeles and two Seawolf class attack submarines, ranging far ahead and on the flanks. Their inclusion had been debated long and hard due to a late night video summit by the heads of NATO countries, following the fourth use of nuclear weapons in anger, since the birth of the bomb.

Admiral Conrad Mann had the task of delivering the ships to the shores of Europe in one piece and had insisted on having a voice in the political decisions of protecting his charges against the submarine, and later the air threat facing them.

His combat group was larger than any other carrier group since the Second World War when it entered the international waters of the Atlantic Ocean, he only hoped it would be the same size when it got to the Irish Sea. There were fifteen thousand men and women in the Naval and merchant ships counting on him to out-fight and out-think the enemy, the fighting men who would man the vehicles would be waiting on the far shore. At least he would not have their deaths on his conscience if he got it wrong.

700 miles southeast of Iceland, twenty-eight submarines of the Red Banner Fleets 4^th, 5^th and 9^th flotilla’s, were spreading out over an area of 350 square miles of ocean, as they separated and made their way west, south-southwest and south-west, intent on closing their designated areas of the Atlantic to all shipping. Thirty-one vessels had begun the voyage, two were suffering from mechanical problems and were continuing at their best speed, another one had been sunk that morning as the bulk of the flotilla’s rushed the GIUK Gap, the area of water between Greenland, Iceland and the United Kingdom. NATO had years before laid a sensor field on the ocean bed, the purpose of which was to listen for submarines and surface vessels, which would have preferred to have remained unnoticed by the West. During the Cold War this area would have been a death trap for them to have even tried to negotiate it, but now the maritime patrol aircraft that roamed above it were greatly reduced in number. One of their number had fallen prey to a patrolling RAF Nimrod, whilst two others had evaded the torpedoes dropped by a US Orion and a second Nimrod, but otherwise their tactic of swamping the defences had worked.

The two of their number trailing behind, would be sunk as they tried to cautiously pick their way across the gap unheard in twelve hours’ time, but their comrades anti-ship missiles and torpedoes carried nuclear warheads as well as conventional ones. They were confident in their ability to sink the eastbound convoys three times over, with the weapons they had.

Aboard the Alpha class attack submarine Omsk, Captain Yuri Kelyovich’s chief worry had been that the nuclear mines off the North Cape would not have detonated, their having been laid over fifteen years before, when the Iron Curtain still stood. If that had been the case then they would have been forced to expend some of their weapons in fighting through to open water, leaving fewer with which to attack the ships carrying reinforcements and war stores to Europe. He had in fact fired three torpedoes at a juicy target of opportunity that was too good to pass by, the damaged HMS Invincible and her tow, which had been hampered and unable to cut loose the tows in time. HMS Ardent had blown up and gone to the bottom even before the British carrier had rolled over and sunk. The Omsk was the flagship of the 9^th Flotilla and led the ten vessels on a south-westerly course to interdict the convoy enroute from New York as she sounded out the way with a superior sonar to that of her sisters.

Via video conferencing, the German chancellor was explaining to the president of the United States as to why his forces were determined to fight on alone if the rest of NATO pulled back beyond Leipzig. The 3 (UK) Mechanised Brigade had taken the brunt of the Red Army thrust and blunted it, they were no longer combat effective though and had withdrawn to their next defence line, behind the Germans to reconstitute.

General Shaw had already put his own professional opinion that they should support the Germans. Pulling back now would be the worst possible move to make, setting a bad precedent whilst boosting Red Army morale and lowering that of their own troops. The president had agreed with the general but wanted the chancellor to have his say.

“Herr Chancellor, I do not see that it is possible to retake the city without massive loss of life and damage to its buildings… ” he held up a hand to stop the German politician from interrupting him, the man obviously expected a refusal. “… IF that is acceptable then I will recommend that we attack the airborne soldiers within the city and its outskirts, starting with the airport.”

The German looked relieved.

“Mr President, cities can be rebuilt, we have done so before and will do so again. It is not acceptable to the German people that the soviet yoke should again fall upon this land, any part of this land… I thank you for your support. Do you think the other member states will agree?”

“I know that Britain and France do, in principle at least. At present Britain has only a two-brigade division in theatre, one of those got its nose bloodied quite badly two days ago but it is the nearest and has more vehicles than troops to fill them.” He paused for effect before continuing.

“Like it or not Chancellor, my troops, the French and the British… will be withdrawing prematurely later today, to positions behind your own troops. We are not withdrawing past Leipzig, but this move is necessary to disengage units from the fight in order that they may drive out the enemy airborne division in the city.”

The German did not like the idea of surrendering ground, his people’s ground, without a more substantial effort but he had to accept the American’s word.

General Allain, the Canadian commander of NATO forces in Europe, would have preferred to have been conducting the battle rather than explaining his army’s actions to a bunch of politician’s. Like most servicemen worth their salt, he had a dislike of politicians but kept his voice and manner neutral as he reported on the previous 24hrs events, to the leaders of the NATO countries. Even when a government head, whose countries forces were not yet engaged, had criticised the British Guards regiments performance, demanding to know why they had not held for longer, General Allain had deadpanned.

“Senor, that is an answer best discovered for oneself, shall I tell them to have a rifle and pack awaiting your arrival, they will be in action again soon?”

The politician in question did not respond, so the Canadian soldier continued.

“The fundamental problem was not the troops but their equipment, which was inferior to that which should be expected of a government to supply. Added to the fact that they were damned unlucky. Their command and control did not fail, it was destroyed by enemy fire… there is a difference gentlemen. The men did not fail their country; their government failed them long before this crisis came to being. How else can you explain why they ran out of anti-tank weapons and their machine guns failed?”

1CG had kept its Warrior APCs and transport at the rear, in readiness to withdraw the battalion when the time came. The breakdown in command and control had cost them in personnel. The Guards don’t run and many of the dead had stayed in their fighting positions, lacking orders to the contrary until overrun. Had it not been for the command and control problems being equalised by a handheld Blowpipe missile, destroying a Czech two-seater attack helicopter that had strayed too close to the fighting then the entire battalion could have been overrun. Of the four battalions in the brigade the regular Argyll’s battalion had fared best. The motor rifle regiment that had swept to the south of the promontory had received the undivided attention of the MLRS batteries. One hundred and forty one Czech armoured fighting vehicles littered the flood plain, well short of the Scottish battalion. Every single vehicles in the regiment had been taken out in one salvo of what the gunners called ‘grid square removal’, delivering almost 42,000 submunitions to the area occupied by the enemy unit. No. 1 Company, 1^st Battalion Coldstream Guards had ceased to exist as a unit and the survivors were divided up amongst the remaining two rifle companies but the majority went to 2 Company.

The 2^nd Battalion Light Infantry and 1^st Battalion Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders had gained a breathing space whilst the Czech 5^th Tanks, 23^rd Motor Rifle and tattered remnants of 21^st Motor Rifle Regiments secured a bridgehead on the western bank and the follow on division passed through and into the attack. It struck the Light Infantry and Highlanders and the juncture of the two units whilst they were recovering from the obligatory artillery bombardment, overrunning the battalions flank companies before crashing into the part-time soldiers of the 7^th/8^th Battalion. The weekend warriors held and the Hussars had swept in behind the Czech 11thTank Regiment from the Light Infantry position, creating havoc and killing the 11^th’s commander before withdrawing.

To the north-east of Leipzig the US 10^th Mechanised Division had held its ground against the worst that the Russian 8^th Motor Rifle Division could throw at it but they were running low on all types of anti-armour munitions. On the right of the NATO line the French 1^st Armoured Division had beaten off the first attack against it and had counter-attacked, drawing off enemy air assets that would otherwise have made the British brigades situation worse.

At Leipzig/Halle airport, the fighting had been furious and the US airborne troops soon ran low on ammunition. After five hours’ of fighting the Americans had been encircled and the Russians had called upon them to surrender. The US troops had sent their reply in deed rather than words by closing with their Russian counterparts in the biggest single bayonet charge by American troops since the United States Marine Corps assault on Belleau Wood in the final year of WW1. The Americans had burst through the Russians at their thinnest point to rejoin NATO lines but left half of their number behind, dead or wounded, including their commanding officer.

The 82^nd Airborne earned three more Medals of Honour in the space of six hours’ in their fight against overwhelming numbers, two were posthumous.

With the conference out of the way, General Shaw updated the president on the situation in the Pacific. The picture was clearer now that they knew they could trust what their own satellites showed them. Taiwan was about to fall and two PLAN invasion fleets were already enroute to the Japanese islands and the largest island in the Philippines, Luzon. Despite the number of Chinese missiles intercepted by the Japanese defence forces, the Chinese had more missiles with which to attack, than Japan had to defend itself with.

“You will notice also Mr President, that there has been no move made against South Korea, by either the North nor the PRC,” he looked meaningfully at the president before stating. “It is the opinion of the JCS that this lack of action indicates that they intend to starve the ROK’s and our forces out. They have no need to expend any effort on their part sir, because they expect to own the Pacific and all access to Korea by land, air and sea.”

The president was thoughtful for a few moments before he spoke. “I think I know you well enough now general, to know you have some point to make, so spit it out!”

“Sir, we cannot resupply or support our troops there for very much longer, the way things are going. They can be of more use elsewhere… such as defending Australia. We estimate that in one week they will be cut-off and beyond our assistance to help, the Pacific is slowly closing to us, at least we can support them in Australia, and they will be fulfilling a vital role, rather than waiting to die or go into captivity.” The general could see the hesitation on the chief executives face, they had treaties with South Korea and substantial business interests there, so he added.

“What the PRC are doing to Japan, with their long range bombardment will be done to the forces in South Korea… get them out now sir, fuck congress, fuck the senate and every other critic. Those boys and girls can come back at a later date, and kick the communists out of Seoul.”

“Okay, general … leave the politics to me, give the orders, withdrawal from South Korea to Australia. Let’s hope to hell their next move isn’t from Australia, to defensive positions on Long Island… what news on the John F Kennedy?”

“As you will recall, they have joined up with the Prince of Wales and repairs are on-going, but we expect them to begin launching for their strike on the enemy carriers within the hour. It coincides with a satellite pass but there is a storm front moving in, if you wish you can watch for yourself providing, there is no over cast, sir?”

The president nodded.

“I’m not sure how I feel about watching those men and women go into combat from the safety of this bunker, so I’ll pass on that, ok?” The president knew that if he watched any of his people being killed, it would haunt his dreams to his dying day.

The head of his secret service detail entered the command centre and chose a position where not only could he catch the president’s eye; it would also be hard for the president to avoid making eye contact with him. When that happened he diplomatically pointed to the watch on his wrist before withdrawing to the door, but did not leave the room, the president knew this because he cast a surreptitious eye over his shoulder five minutes later, the man was still there, staring right back at him.

Once he had finished with matters he could not possibly foist onto someone else, the president left his staff to continue business in his absence and went to his room.

When he was not engaged in national business, the president was living in a 10’x10’ concrete room that had once been the domain of an air force colonel. His personal physician had recommended that he have eight hours’ sleep a day and his secret service detail were enforcing it. They were not pulling their side arms as a threat to ensure he followed doctors’ orders; they were more insidious than that, they played on his conscience, reminding him that his country needed him alert, not psychotic. The chief executive was curious as to the living conditions of an ordinary airmen, when this base had been a part of the nation’s nuclear deterrent, he rather imagined that the airman was not paid nearly enough if it meant living in anything more grim than this room. The First Lady and his children were up in the Rockies at another location and he missed them. The short calls on the videophone hardly qualified as a family relationship and he did not have any photographs of them here, all of those were back in the half-demolished White House. The grey walls of his room were devoid of any adornment apart from a framed instruction on fire drills and the ceiling light was little more than a bulb and toughened glass with a wire guard.

Seven hours’ later the president was in that room when a knock on the door awoke him. It was an hour before his sleep period was due to end but he had slept solidly until just then. He had not bothered to undress other than to remove his jacket, so he swung his feet to the floor before standing and slipping the jacket back on.

“Come, but if you aren’t a troop of dancing girls with laid back moral values, it will be a very brief interview!”

Terry Jones entered with an apologetic look on his face, behind him was a man whom the president had seen before but could not place the name.

“I foolishly left my tambourine and veils in the office Mr President, sorry about that.”

“I’m not,” replied the president to the CIA Director, and held out his hand to the man who had accompanied him.

“I am sure we have met sir, but I cannot place the name?”

Dark eyed with tiredness, rumpled and unshaven, the man shook the proffered hand.

“Scott Tafler, Mr President… we met last week in the situation room, I explained why I thought we were going to be attacked.”

“Jeez, was it only a week ago, it seems like months.” He gestured to the bed, motioning them to sit whilst pulling up the tubular framed chair that constituted one third of the furniture in the room.

“I presumed that you chose this venue, because you have something particularly sensitive for me, Terry?”

“Sir, I sent Scott to London to contact the Russians who blew the whistle on the bomb plot. He debriefed them but there was nothing more they knew that could assist us. Perhaps I should let Scott explain why we are here now, sir.”

At the president’s nod, Scott began.

“In Russia, they have reformed their intelligence service and again named it the KGB; we know that one of the principle plotters was given the position as its chief, which was Anatolly Peridenko Mr President. However, he only held office for less than a day; the word is that he is dead at the Premiers orders.”

Looking over at Terry Jones, the president raised an inquisitive eyebrow.

“Peridenko was a resourceful and ambitious man sir, the Premier is the same, and he probably eliminated what he saw as a future threat to his own office.”

“Please carry on Scott; I hope you are going to tell me that one of the Russians who assisted us has been chosen as Peridenko’s replacement?”

“No sir, the new chief is Elena Torneski, a very capable woman who has until now been restricted by the ‘glass ceiling’ of their intelligence community. It is her ability and apparent acceptance of limited promotion that would seem to be why the Premier has chosen her.”

The president nodded,

“I am guessing that you see a possible advantage here. Is she on our pay roll?”

Scott shook his head.

“No sir, but she spent some years recruiting new talent, in fact it was she who recruited Svetlana Vorsoff, one of our friends in England. Miss Vorsoff was originally recruited to be what is known as a ‘Sparrow’, politely speaking, Sparrows use their feminine charm’s for the State in an espionage role. Torneski obviously revised her opinion of Svetlana’s potential and had her transferred to the directorate responsible for deep cover operatives, ‘sleepers’ if you like. I have gotten to know her fairly well over the past few days, and I would agree that as bed-bait for unwary westerners on business in Russia it would have been a great waste of an intelligent and very able young lady. Svetlana states that she and Elena Torneski became friends and that friendship was current until the time this crisis arose, although they have had no contact for over two years. She is confident that Torneski will listen to her and help end this madness.” He removed a folder containing two files from his attaché case and passed it over. The president speed-read the summaries on Torneski and Vorsoff before studying the photographs, his eyebrows shot up and he removed a photograph of Vorsoff as nature intended, holding it up for the two CIA men.

“Scott, next time you stop by, leave this old fart behind and bring her,” he said, inclining his head at the CIA director. He replaced the photo and handed back the folder.

“On second thoughts, don’t. The way my lucks running the First Lady will walk in and my greeting to her will be ‘Darling, it’s not what you think’… anyway, please carry on with what you were saying.”

“Mr President, as you are aware, the Russian Premier has not been seen since the attack started. Obviously he is in a secure location somewhere, and if anyone is likely to know the location, it will be his chief of intelligence, and knowing where he is could be of immense value. He is apparently the driving force behind all this and if we could take him out, we may see a resolution, an end to the war,” added Terry Jones.

“To know that, we have to know who else was involved and who in the military is for and who is against it… you are thinking about engineering a coup, of course.” The chief executive made the remark as a statement rather than a question.

“I can see a hell of a lot of ‘what ifs’ in the offing Terry but I would appreciate you keeping me up to speed with any developments. You came here to speak to me so as to keep this operation black of course?” he said to the CIA chief.

“As pitch, sir.”

“Good,” he remarked. “What do you need?”

Terry Jones put his hand inside his jacket and removed several sheets of paper, which he handed over.

“Hand written,” remarked the president as he took out a pair of spectacles from his pocket, shook them open one handed and put them on.

“Good, let’s keep it this way as much as possible… ” he nodded toward the glowing laptop computer on the nightstand.

“… I swear that things watching me sometimes, ever since they got into the NSA computers I keep wondering what else they’ve done that we don’t know about.”

He was silent as he read both sides of the half dozen sheets. Removing his glasses he handed the pages back.

“You’ve obviously already put a lot of thought into this, right down to anticipating the reluctance of the Air Force cutting loose a Nighthawk crew at a time like this. I like it Terry, who did you have in mind?”

“Actually sir, this is all Scott’s doing. He flew back from London yesterday with his plan and drove all night to get here and pitch it to me.”

The president was impressed.

“No shit… that would account for you looking even more beat up than I am?” he smiled at Tafler.

“I was hoping to get you to stick around, it would have diverted my surgeon’s attention from me. I’ve read your theory, now talk me through it please?”

“It is just an idea right now, but you didn’t laugh in my face when you just read the outline. Obviously the feasibility has to be gone into by someone more qualified than myself, but loading up a 2 megaton warhead on a SRAM into a Nighthawk, and flying it into Russia is going to require refuelling using buddy stores along the way, that means other Nighthawks being involved. The aircraft will have to be virtually full of fuel when it lands there, which means diverting resources from the main effort?”

“Why don’t you let me worry about prying them free for one night, carry on please Scott.”

“Saddam Hussain moved about a hell of a lot during the Gulf War, it made targeting him almost impossible. We know that Russia has at least four hardened shelters for its politburo in time of war, so we have to assume the possibility that the current leadership could be playing Saddam's shell game too. We still have ICBMs, not many but we still have them, I’m guessing that you would not use them against the Premiers shelter even if you were certain he was there?”

The president shook his head vigorously.

“Both they and the PRC have ICBMs, they would see the launch and they would counter-strike, probably massively.”

“Correct sir, so we use a method of delivery that they cannot detect and one that is close enough to strike before the target moves again… if they are shifting around from shelter to shelter.”

There was silence for a moment as the president thought it through, looking for loopholes, before deciding he did not know enough.

“I got to this office by kissing babies, having good teeth and telling more credible lies than the other guy. Intelligence is not a pre-requisite for holding either high or low office in government. That’s why I have a damn good staff and the JCS to do the thinking for me,” he said with a rueful smile.

“Let me ask them before I give my blessing, carry on with the preparations in the meantime… what is the protection like at these Russian shelters?”

Terry Jones answered that one.

“One and a half megaton direct hit, three megaton near-miss, sir.”

“And what qualifies as a near miss?”

“Two miles Mr President.”

“Can’t we stage out of Germany, Britain or Alaska… why Russia?”

“It would take too long to launch from Ramstein, they would have to fly a huge detour to avoid radars and defences on the battlefield. The same goes for the UK; it took twelve hours’ just to get into position to knock down the Russian A50 that they had covering Belorussia on the first day. The distance from Alaska to Moscow is comparable to flying from Atlanta to Los Angeles and back. We only get one shot at this sir.” The CIA Director stated earnestly.

“I don’t want this turning into a debacle like the Delta Force rescue mission in Iran did, back in the seventies.”

“Sir, we have an F-15 pilot who is F-117A qualified but temporarily unfit for combat duties in fast jets, due to strain injuries after an ejection yesterday. We have identified an out of the way strip that is suitable for putting down on, three hundred miles from Moscow, and we have assets who can meet them and assist with vehicles and safe houses. Added to the fact that the crew are female, they aren’t likely to draw attention as a man would.”

“How so?” queried the president.

“All males between seventeen and forty-five have been called up for military service in Russia; they are now all in uniform. The only exceptions are deserters, draft dodgers and essential industry workers. The police are very active in stopping all hale and hearty males in civilian clothes, to discover which of those categories they fill.”

“I never thought of that. Have you got a right seat picked?”

“Yes sir, Captain Patricia Dudley, she was in R&D until this morning working on the Nighthawk X, the testbed for future F-117 upgrades. I took the liberty of having her posted to Europe as a battlefield casualty replacement; she will be in London tonight.”

“Okay, so who is the pilot?”

“Major Caroline Nunro, she was shot down south of Leipzig yesterday.”

The president laughed.

“The air forces own pugilistic pin-up… good choice. Have you ordered her to volunteer yet?”

Scott did not know what the president was referring to, but he answered.

“No sir, she is in transit to London as we speak. The cover story is that she injured her back punching out and will be attached to USAFs PR department until she gets her flight status back and we have not yet told her the real reason.”

“Do yourself a favour Scott, ask nicely and watch her right… or you’ll look even worse than you do now!”

“Sir?”

It had taken well over forty-eight hours’ for news of the wars outbreak to become more than supposition by the media. When Janet had watched the breakfast television news reader announce that NATO forces had come under sustained attack during the previous afternoon she had felt sick at first, and then anger at the vagueness, the generalisations of the reports. There was no news of which units had been involved or even how NATO had fared.

Karen looked at her Mum’s expression and asked if her Dad was okay? Jimmy looked at his sister like she was cracked. His expression said it all, of course their Daddy was okay, he was Dad and therefore immortal.

She bundled them off to school and made her way to work where she had tried to push it all into a back room of her consciousness and lock the door, but it was the main topic of conversation amongst her colleagues and the boss had allowed a television to be turned on in the office and tuned to Sky News. Nevertheless she shut out the constant updates, the weary drone of retired soldiers wheeled in to give their opinions as ‘experts’ on the subject. She did a good job on the whole but in the late morning she looked up from her desk and noticed that although her colleagues were focussed on the TV screen they were consciously avoiding looking at her.

“In Germany, NATO took the brunt of an attack by sixteen Soviet armoured divisions supported by heavy air and artillery which employed chemical weapons… ” stated a newsreader. “and we are receiving reports that overnight a number of units, including British, sustained heavy casualties.”

It took a large dose of self-control to continue working as normal. The news for the nation grew worse as government sources eked out the real details in small packages. All the better to dispense the news of national disaster and the worsening of the situation for the West. The use of nuclear weapons by the soviets to breach the naval line at the North Cape would not be released for a week. Britain’s exact naval losses on the first day of the war would not become public knowledge for weeks.

The single screw of the Royal Navy’s diesel powered hunter/killer (SSK) submarine HMS Ulysses turned slowly, edging the vessel along at one knot, sixty feet below the turbulent surface of the Barents Sea, 2.38 miles northeast of the fishing village of Tysp-Navolok, on the Poluostrov Rybachiy peninsular. The traitorous coastal tides and numerous offshore wrecks, many uncharted by the west, made the going tricky even in peacetime. Ulysses Type 2026 towed array had been secured when they reach the 100 fathom mark.

Towed arrays this close inshore was far less effective than in the deep ocean, and a hazard to the vessel in the shallower water. There is far too much noise for the system to process, but that ambient noise made the vessel harder to hear as well.

One thousand yards to the northeast of them a Russian Kilo class diesel-electric boat was making five knots for thirty minute periods and then drifting and listening for another thirty. Ulysses had heard her, just, whilst she had been moving, but had the British submarine been a few minutes later, or earlier it could have been a completely different story.

Twenty miles to the north, the Royal Navy SSN, HMS Temeraire awaited the small diesel boats return, her sonar department were listening hard for her, or any trouble, but the shoreline was too noisy for them to be aware of events.

This close to the major military district around Murmansk, Russian coastal security was tight, apart from the Kilo, there were three surface combat vessels with twenty miles of their position, one Mirazh class patrol vessel, a Krivak III frigate and a Grisha V corvette. It was focusing both of the Royal Navy captain’s minds wonderfully, but not doing a great deal of good for Ulysses skippers’ digestive system. Forty-seven men, not counting himself, were relying on him doing it right, getting them in and then getting them out.

“Sonar… how longs he been moving now?”

“Twenty-one minutes… Now, sir.”

“Thank you.” He wanted a little more water above them and he still had plenty beneath their keel at this point.

“Five down, seventy feet… ease the bubble if you will, Cox’n.”

As the boat steadied at the new depth, the captain checked the chronometer.

“Engines, all stop, absolute silence everyone, let’s not break the boredom of an otherwise monotonous day for him.”

The captain looked hard at the chart with the outline of the estimated western edge of the minefield guarding the approaches to the Kola Inlet. The current was going to move the 2,400-ton submarine uncomfortable close to it in the next thirty minutes, but so long as it stayed at its present rate and the Kilo moved on again as usual they should have a safe margin of 700m.

A minute later, sonar signalled that the Kilo’s barely perceptible electric motor had ceased and his eyes drifted to the clock.

Exactly thirty minutes later the captain’s heart rate eased slightly when sonar reported the Kilo was again making way, but it only lasted a moment.

“Captain, sonar… … .aspect change on the Kilo sir, she’s turning… ..she’s coming around to port… .now bearing zero zero seven degrees, course one eight zero, depth one hundred feet, speed five knots!”

The captain felt several sets of eyes on him now, the Russian was coming toward them and even if it wasn’t because they had been detected, it meant they could drift onto a mine in the next hour. He looked again at the chart, even if the Admiralty had erred on the side of caution when marking the fields bounds, another hour could put them well beyond the line on the chart. He viewed it logically, if they got underway, they were screwed, if they fired on the Kilo, they were screwed, but if they didn’t hit a mine then they would make it. It all depended on how much accuracy had been applied in the marking of their chart.

“We wait,” he announced simply.

The digital plot showed the Kilo closing on the Upholder class submarine over the next thirty minutes, but as the hands showed exactly half an hour from the time the Kilo had started her motors the sonar department did not signal that she was drifting and listening once more, the plot showed her still coming on. After another eighteen minutes the Kilo was abeam of the British submarine, with only two hundred and forty-nine yards separating them, but she kept moving at a steady five knots for a minute longer.

“Captain, aspect change on the Kilo… … .turning to starboard, speed constant at five knots.”

“Good… group up, slow ahead main motor and bring us around, slowly, to two seven zero degrees, if you please.” He wanted to get away from this damned minefield.

The First Lieutenant sidled up next to the Captain, and then turned his body so that no one in the control room could observe him speaking.

“I almost started to get worried there sir,” he said quietly.

“When he didn’t stop on schedule, I almost laughed aloud with relief!”

“Really number one?” the captain replied.

“Because that was the point where I nearly lost control of the old sphincter muscles.”

The First Lieutenant gave him a puzzled look, unsure as to whether his skipper was making a joke.

The captain saw the expression and decided to educate the man “The reason he didn’t stop Jeremy, is because he knew the edge of the minefield here is too bloody close to piss about with!”

He stabbed a finger at their current position on the chart, inside the marked area.

They had another thirty miles to go, into the Motovskiy Zaliv Inlet where their live cargo, a four man SBS team, would swim ashore from the submerged submarine. In 1995 the UK’s government of the day had decided that the cost of defending the country was still too expensive and sold off hardware at a fraction of its value as well as putting thousands of patriotic young men and women on the dole queues. The sales did not cover even ten percent of the equipment’s initial cost and the extra thousands of unemployed were a further drain on the nation’s social security benefit system, because the government declined to spend money retraining the ex-service personnel for civilian occupations. Four out of five almost brand new Upholder class submarines had been sold to Canada but the fifth, Ulysses, had been saved, retained should the need arise for covert insertion operations.

Once that was accomplished then they themselves would creep back out into relatively open water and make for Norwegian waters, to collect another team of swimmers. Temeraire would remain to monitor traffic entering and exiting the Kola Inlet. The SBS team and the nuclear attack submarine had similar roles, the marines were there to monitor troop movements for any sign of an invasion of the Scandinavian countries, and plot a bit of mischief of course. The Temeraire herself had land attack, Tomahawk cruise missiles and Spearfish torpedoes with which to cause mayhem if so ordered.

Once the Kilo’s departing course was established, the Ulysses altered course to two two four degrees and resumed her insertion of the SBS team.

The Royal Marines in the team faced an hours swim followed by a night climb of a hundred-foot cliff face in order to avoid the passive intruder detection systems on the rocky beaches.

Admiral Dalton had addressed the officers and crew of the USS John F Kennedy, three hours’ ago, at the same time, the Captains of all the ships in the combat group read out the message from the Admiral to their crews. They had enough weapons remaining for one strike, and even if successful they would probably succumb to the enemy retaliatory attacks that would swiftly follow.

It wasn’t a ‘damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead’ or an ‘England expects’ type of speech, it was quite matter of fact and down to earth.

With no defensive armament other than her Phalanx close-in defence system, HMS Prince of Wales was to the north of the big carrier, where she was controlling ASW operations for the group.

As before, the group was at full EMCON so as to give no warning of their position or intention, and the ships were either at battle stations or action stations, depending upon which side of the Atlantic they hailed from.

Rain came down upon the ships in sheeting gusts that frequently came in curving horizontally down from the heavens. Aboard the Type 23 frigate, HMS Malta, on outer picket duty to the west, the seas were breaking over her bows and the water that crashed against the forecastle was deep green. It was early in the year for the typhoon season to have started, and young naval ratings that took the stormy Atlantic in their stride, discovered just how nasty nature could really be when she was in the mood.

The edge of the storm was lashing the coast of the Kamchatka Peninsula and small port of Ust’-Kamchatsk, where the PLAN and Russian carrier combat groups had gone in order to carry out repairs. The port was sat on low ground, slightly higher than the marshy ground that surrounded it. The water was too shallow and the port too small to accept anything bigger than a frigate, but the bay offered calmer waters and the protection of land based defences whilst the ships were patched up. To the west of the bay the ground rose in a long ridge called Gora Shish and beyond that the heights of a smallish mountain named Klyuchevskaya Sopka. These features masked the SW to NE running valley that ran downhill from the hills just behind Petropavlovsk-Kamchatskiy, to the bogs and marshes that surrounded the port of Ust’-Kamchatsk. Captain Hong was aboard the Mao supervising repairs, the repairs that could as easily have been carried out whilst they were underway, in his opinion. Admiral Li was ashore for the night, having turned the Mayor and his family out of their home, rather than stay aboard where the repairs disturbed his sleep.

With the exception of two destroyers for close-in air defence, the warships of the group had remained off the coast. With the approach of the storm they stood out to sea, giving them sea room well clear of the rocky coast in case the main fury of the storm swerved their way.

The last container ships to pass through the Bering Straits before the shooting started, were passing the mouth of the Ust’-Kamchatsk bay enroute to ports of call on the Chinese mainland. All three merchantmen’s radars picked up the warships and their captains ordered the speed reduced and lookouts posted, fearing collisions in the crowded sea.

On shore, a powerful sea and air search ground radar swept its beam through 360’. Six SA-10 Grumble air defence batteries were manned and three of their Tombstone radars also swept the horizon, augmenting the long range cover of the A-50 forty thousand feet above whilst the remainder had slaved their systems to the A-50.

Four Z2S62S6 Tungushkas, two ZSU-57-2 and four ZSU 23-4s were scattered about the port and on the higher ground above, their radars were at standby whilst they received data down-linked from the A-50, but the Tungushkas IR scanners were active. The operators aboard the aircraft were peering intently at their screens, concerned with submarine launched anti-ship missiles attacking the ships below, and as such their radar was sweeping back and forth through 100’, rather than 180. The typhoon had degraded the reception they were getting and almost constant sweeps enhanced the chances of detecting incoming missiles. They were not watching for aircraft because the only enemy carrier within a thousand miles was reportedly severely damaged and fleeing south. It came as a surprise to them when they picked up interference of a kind more severe than they had previously experienced with tropical storms. They delayed for five minutes before concluding that it was not a natural source but man-made interference and heading towards Ust’-Kamchatsk. The A-50 put out the alert to the nearby fighter station with its detachment of three Su-27s, coastal air defence batteries and the warships. Neither carrier could launch its air group as the ships were anchored and needed to be underway, heading into wind at a minimum of twenty-four knots, for their aircraft to have a chance at getting aloft. The military district headquarters passed the air raid warning upwards and ten minutes later the Premier was informed, he was not a man given to indecision.

The PRC aircraft that had first attacked the USS John F Kennedy, had staged out of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatskiy, some miles south of Ust’-Kamchatsk and had since returned to their home bases. The reason for the choice was that it was a long-range bomber base, built in order to attack Japan, if necessary, in the 1950’s and had all the facilities they needed. Russia could just as easily staged the attack, but because the American carrier fleet had been such a thorn in their side, inhibiting their ambitions for so long, it had been agreed that China should be allowed to sink the Americans.

Petropavlovsk-Kamchatskiy was the home of three regiments of Backfires, two of Mig-31s and the A-50s that patrolled the region, along with a regiment of An-72P maritime patrol aircraft of the Border Guard.

Whilst the three Su-27s at Ust’-Kamchatsk were scrambling the four A-50s and fifteen An-72Ps were being ordered into the air to find the carrier that the attackers came from. In the meantime the Backfires were to upload for an anti-shipping strike, the three most experienced crews would have a pair of AS-17 anti-shipping missiles each, with 500kt nuclear warheads.

Had the weather not been so foul, the two seat F/A-18F Hornets that had made landfall to the south of the port would have been down in the weeds, but in the pitch dark with buffeting winds that was highly inadvisable.

Before the clouds had obscured the area, the US satellites had seen the enemy carriers approaching the port and the latest RORSAT’s radar images were unclear as to where in the mass of returns, the big ships were.

The leading four F/A-18Fs in this group were configured for wild weasel SAM suppression, whilst the other half carried four AGM-84A anti-ship missiles apiece, five minutes behind them. They were going for the port and if the ships weren’t there they would take on the warships at sea from the landward side.

Coming in from the sea were a further twenty-two F/A-18Cs and F-14 Tomcats, two carried nothing but jammer pods whilst the remainder were loaded with HARMs and AGM-84A Harpoons, they carried only two Sidewinders apiece for defence.

In order to burn through the jamming, the A-50 focused its radar beam even further, to the annoyance of the self-propelled ZSUs who had a quick radio conference, after which they killed the downlink and went active.

At 250 miles the A-50 burnt through the jamming and launched six land based SA-10 Grumble, supersonic missiles their way before quickly slaving the nearest four ships by data link, and launching a further fifteen of the Grumbles naval variant at the attackers also. The A-50 was in the process of slaving a further six ships air defence systems when two HARMs impacted within a split second of each other. The missiles were fired from the wild weasel element in the valley that ran parallel to the bay, they guided onto the

A-50s huge radome and the fuselage split in two, spilling out those operators not strapped in as both sections began the 40,000 foot plunge earthwards.

With the loss of their external guidance data, the twenty-one SA-10 missiles reverted to their own narrow aperture internal sensors, as they approached the incoming American aircraft, none acquired a target and they flew right on by.

Commander ‘Freddie’ Kruger led the anti-ship element of F/A-18Fs as they sped along the valley, which would dogleg east at the far end where it opened out to the sea. His RIO, Lt Slim Templar had his eyes glued to threat screen, which with the destruction of the A-50 had cleared. They were at 500’ above the valley floor, although had it been daylight they would have been at 50’. “Sixteen miles to the turn, threats clear,” he told the pilot. Ahead of them on the ground a light appeared. The preceding element had awoken at least one resident of the tiny village of Kirganik, who had come outdoors to see what all the fuss was about. It was very rare for his country's air force to be aloft at night, even rarer for them to venture down low. The approach to the small field was out over the bay.

Both elements were in trail as they flew between the steep sided mountains flanking the valley, until the first Hornet banked hard right, pulling four G’s as it shot clear of the valley, straight into the path of an Su-27 as it took off on burner from the small airfield. The vertical stabilisers were sheared from the Hornets fuselage, sending it cartwheeling toward the small town that surrounded the port.

Admiral Li had been awoken by a phone call, stating that they were under attack, at first he refused to believe it until he heard the shore based SA-10 Grumbles launch with a roar. Pulling on his trousers he shouted for his aide, asleep in a rickety chair outside his door. He snapped at the man as he entered, the Admiral was struggling to button his flies as he ordered him to open the curtains and tell him what he could see. Having flung the curtains wide both men froze… and then screamed as they saw the crippled Hornet, a split second before it impacted the front of the house.

The Sukhoi’s left intake had struck the Hornets stabilisers and sucked in fragments, which shattered the fast spinning turbine blades of the left Turmanski engine. A fragment of blade severed the left main fuel feed and the interceptor turned into a comet, trailing a 200m long tail of fire across the bay. In the thirty seconds before the second Hornet appeared, two ZSU-23-4s, a ZSU 57-4 and two of the ZSU-2S62S6s had pivoted in the direction the first American had appeared from, what followed was a slaughter. Two of the ZSUs were destroyed along with one Tombstone radar, but so were the next three Hornets, with two falling to a mixture of 57mm and 23mm cannon fire, whilst one was blotted from existence by a heat seeking SA-8 missile.

Freddie Kruger barked orders at the remainder of his element when he heard the shouted warnings from the wild weasel flight that the valley mouth was locked up with AAA. None of the lead element now answered his calls and he accepted that the worst had happened. At the end of the valley was a steep re-entrant and he now planned to fly up before turning south in a curving 180 to the right, that would bring them over the port from the north. The two surviving Sukhoi’s ignored calls from the warships to intercept the aircraft approaching from the sea, they knew the backdoor was open and intended checking that no-one else was using it before wandering farther abroad. Their lookdown radars caught Kruger’s four F/A-18Fs close to the earth with mountains both sides and loaded down with ordnance; none of the Hornets made it out of the valley.

The approaching Tomcats and Hornets radars began picking up the tracks of ships, and they pickled off HARMs to neutralise the air defence radars and switched on their PAVE TAC systems as they began looking for the carriers. At about the same time, the warship radars burnt through the jamming and ships ripple fired SA-10 Grumbles, Klinok and Hongqi-7 missiles in reply. At 30 miles out the first thirty Harpoons were launched, nineteen survived to pass the outer line of pickets where they went active, seeking the largest radar returns. Behind them a further forty Harpoons dropped from hard point’s, two continued to fall as their motors failed and hit the sea in showers of spray. Five Russian and PLAN warships were struck by HARMs, degrading the air defence cover by twenty percent. Of the first wave of nineteen Harpoons to penetrate the outer picket screen, four were dummied by chaff clouds but causing damage to ships when their 220lb warheads went off, whilst eight fell to point defence systems. The remaining seven found targets even as the second wave passed the outer pickets. Three USN aircraft fell to supersonic SA-10s before all offensive stores were expended and they could turn for home, but a further four fell into the ocean before they could get out of range.

Ashore, the senior operator of the ground station picked up a phone, he spoke rapidly into the receiver, giving the Americans last course and bearing before they disappeared from his screens. Aboard the container ships the crews found themselves in the middle of a very hot war and their captains called for full speed to clear the area. Harpoons struck two destroyers and two fleet replenishment ships, despite the clouds of chaff they threw up. Unlike the warships the merchantmen had no chaff dispensers, added to which they were far larger than any other ship outside the bay. The Pullidin Osk was carrying second-hand cars, plastic kitchen utensils and tinned foodstuffs in containers from Murmansk; she had already rolled over in flames when the last two Harpoons slammed into her. Of her companions, one was down by the bow; the foredeck already awash and her sterncastle had completely disappeared, blasted apart by two successive Harpoons. The third ship had avoided being hit by of the American missiles, as she had been in the lee of a PLAN replenishment ship, passing within 500m of the fleet auxiliary and seeking to get clear of the combat zone. The three Harpoons that struck the replenishment ship set off the munitions and 30,000 gallons of high-octane aviation fuel it carried, in a colossal explosion that rolled the merchantman onto her starboard beam and drenched her in fire. In the bay, Captain Hong allowed himself to breathe again now that the air raid was over. No Harpoon had come within three miles of hitting either carrier.

The odd mix of aircraft, that constituted the CAP protecting the three British and nine US ships, was above the storm at 32,000’.

Sixty miles to the landward of the ships, an E-2 Hawkeye had energised its radar once the air group broke radio silence to report it was returning. After half an hour its radar had painted over two aircraft.

Sat off the Hawkeye’s port wing the pair of Sea Harriers dropped toward the clouds and split, one going for each target. Two F-14 Tomcats moved from their position over the fleet to replace them, leaving the last pair as the TAOs reserve.

Papa Zero Two steered due east as Sandy Cummings completed the business of ensuring that the single AIM-54 Phoenix he carried was receiving the Hawkeye’s data stream. The big missile dropped away before accelerating and going near ballistic, its terminal flight to the probing A-50 would be almost vertical. To the north, Sub Lt ‘Donny’ Osmond kept hold of his missiles as he entered the murk below the cloud to stalk the slow moving track ahead of him, guided in by the Hawkeye’s data link. At 400m he selected guns and flipped his own radar to active, locking up the Border Guard An-72 and sawing its port wing off at a point 2’ from the fuselage, with a single burst from his rotary Vulcan cannon. He was ninety miles closer to the land than the Hawkeye, and as the Russian maritime patrol aircraft tumbled towards the sea he picked up a mass of radar tracks and they were all headed his way.

Having received the last course and bearing from the Ust’-Kamchatsk radar operator, the regional air commander decided to take a chance that the Americans would not change course once clear of enemy radar. The John F Kennedy’s CAG had gambled that the Russians would assume just that, but he was wrong.

Alerting the Hawkeye and the remaining CAP, Donny mentally kissed his ass goodbye and reefed the Sea Harrier around to face the oncoming Russians.

Being subsonic, Nikki Pelham overhauled the Sea Harrier flown by Sandy Cummings, her Tomcat and her wingmans passed him before he was in firing range to loose off his AMRAAMs. They all saw the radar track of Papa Zero Two disappear from the screens but so too had a pair of the fast approaching enemy.

Admiral Dalton was on the bridge when the first of the returning strike aircraft entered the pattern. He was the son of a sailor man, as were his father and grandfather before him, the only difference was that he was the first of the Dalton’s to have joined as a commissioned officer. The heaving ocean was causing the flight deck to roll and pitch, reminding the Admiral of tropical storms during his own flying days. On one such night, returning from a strike in the Ia Drang valley, he recalled holding his breath as his F-4s undercarriage slammed onto the deck as the bow began its uproll with a vengeance. His nosewheel tyre had burst and the main undercarriage collapsed, fracturing a fuel line and the fighter-bomber had been engulfed in flames before it even stopped sliding along the deck. Firemen in silver suits pulled him and his unconscious RIO from the wreck. Lt (jg) Dalton had puked his guts up on to the wet deck, which made a hat trick, because his bladder and bowels had let go before he had been rescued. A salty old Petty officer had stood beside him as he completed his embarrassment, chewing on a wad of tobacco and watching the foam being played over the bent and blistered airframe. Spitting out a brown stream of tobacco juice the Petty Officer had at last spoken.

“Could’ve been worse.” Dalton had wiped his mouth and looked up at the man.

“You mean I could have been killed?” The Petty Officer kept on looking at the fire fighting activity, never once looking at the shaken young aviator.

“Nope… ” the ‘sir’ being noticeably absent, “… could’ve been me in that thing, and that really would have upset your mother” Dalton’s father had not been a man to show emotion.

The Admiral smiled at the memory and looked out once again at the rolling deck and black, ugly seas, letting a shiver run through him. The tannoy crackled.

“Air raid warning, air raid warning… close all hatch’s and bulkhead doors… damage control crews, close up!” The Marine on duty saluted as the Admiral hurried off the bridge, heading to the CIC.

Nikki selected targets for her two AIM-54s and as soon as they closed to 120km she pickled them both off, as did her wingman. She thought it had bought them some time, the tracks on her screen jinked to break the Phoenix’s locks as soon as they detected them. At thirty miles they loosed the AMRAAMs and she called up the remaining pair of Tomcats that were making a beeline for them from the ships. “Get your asses in the game as fast as you can boys, we are not going to hold them long on our own.” Two minutes later and they were completely engaged with four Mig-31s, whilst the remaining nineteen continued on, clearing the way for the Backfires that were five minutes behind them.

Closer to the edge of the storm as they were, Sandy Cummings saw the first hint of dawn appear as a dirty grey haze whilst looking over his shoulder for the last pair of Tomcats, and he wondered how cold it was in the angry water below. His threat warning brought him back to the present, screaming at him that there were missiles locked onto him. He could not see anything ahead, to the west all was blackness. He ejected chaff and flares whilst pulling back into a vertical jink before rolling over into a split S, by which time Mig-31s were passing him by with the exception of two that peeled off, turning hard to get into firing position behind him. In the dark neither Russian could see what aircraft it was that they were up against, and both assumed it was a Tomcat or a Hornet. It was for that very reason that they overshot the Sea Harrier, which had come to an almost dead stop in mid-air. Sandy heard the growl of his Sparrows seeker heads acquiring the Russian advanced fighters and pickled one off, waited to a count of three and fired a second heat seeker. He cancelled the vectored thrust and closed the speed brakes, allowing the aircraft to travel earthwards as he again picked up flying speed before he turned back toward the west. He could see a thick cluster of new tracks appearing at the edge of his screen.

“There’s never a witness around when you need one!” he said to himself. No one would believe the ease… or fluke, with which he had downed the two Russian machines. He had two missiles left and wanted to avoid the jumbled dogfights ahead, in order to get in amongst the Backfires. They were travelling at supersonic speed so he would only have a chance with a head on engagement.

Nikki had accounted for one Mig-31 since the furball had started, but her wingman had mid-aired with a Russian so she was having a touch of déjà vu right now, mixing it on her own with two enemies. On the last occasion the pilots had been experienced, in an air force that allowed its pilots to fly and train every day, unlike her present foes that thought twice a month was extravagant. After two minutes she got tone on one, and blew his ass away with a deflection shot using guns. His buddy lost his nerve and broke away, diving to the west. As tempting as it was to waste the little fucker with a missile as he ran away, her business was keeping away airframes that could kill ships and that didn’t mean fighters.

In the John F Kennedy’s CIC the staff were casting apprehensive glances at the plot to westward, where the Russian were coming from. The foul weather and high seas had caused the first three aircraft attempting to land to bolter, they were all short on fuel and they needed to get down, refuel and load up air to air ordnance asap. That wasn’t going to happen though, Admiral Dalton knew it and so did everyone else in CIC. It was going to come down to his ships air defence systems alone that would either pass or fail the task of keeping away the ship killers.

Sandy glanced at his fuel gauges and did his mental arithmetic, he had been aloft for an hour before the first enemy aircraft had appeared and he’d used a frightening amount since then. He did the sum twice and both times the answer was that he was going swimming. He counted twenty-five aircraft approaching as he set up his missile shots, once they were away he switched to guns. A fireball in the sky ahead told him that one of his missiles had scored, then he got tone on his guns without being able to see the fast approaching bomber. He touched his finger to the guns and held it down, he was still doing so when the vertical tail fin of a Backfire took off the last six feet of his left wing and the Sea Harrier began a sickening roll to the left. At 12,000’ Sandy was inverted as he ejected from the stricken aircraft, blacking out as the seat shot him clear.

“We’re losing oil pressure on the right engine Nikki; something must have come loose back there.” Chubby informed her. They were in burner, closing in fast on the bombers. She checked her gauges but didn’t let up on the throttle as she bore on westwards. Somehow the smaller Sea Harrier had overtaken them when they had been knife-fighting with the Migs; they did not know which of their friends was flying the one ahead of them.

“Bye, fella.” Chubby put his hand on the radar screen and whispered when they saw its track merge with an oncoming bomber, both tracks faded out within seconds after that.

They had two AMRAAMs left and punched them both off at optimum range. Behind her, Chubby punched the air as both scored and then she got off a sustained burst of cannon before killing the afterburner and sweeping the wings forward to grab air. Pulling around in a six-G turn that had their flight suits inflating uncomfortably, squeezing legs and stomach in an effort to keep blood from draining from their brains. Despite this her vision dimmed, became tunnel like and her biceps knotted in order to retain her grip on the stick as they turned in behind the bombers.

The Backfires now had the first ships on radar and they dived toward the sea, splitting up as they did so to make the defenders jobs that much more difficult.

Nikki and Chubby had lost airspeed and ground in their turn, and Nikki swept the wings back and shoved the throttles to their stops. If it had not been for the storm the enemy would have stood out against the rising sun, as it was the east was only a slight shade lighter than the west and they could see nothing with the naked eye.

On radar the nearest Backfire was five miles ahead as Nikki double checked she was on guns and put the nose down, closing on the Russian who sat 100 feet above the waves. The oil warning light for the right engine was a harsh red glow as the engine temperature grew but she kept right on going. The heads up display gun reticule turned to green, at the same time as the right engine, fire warning light lit, but Nikki walked the tracer from one Backfires left wing tip to its right before pulling back to avoid flying debris. Only then did she shut the engine down and engage the fire extinguisher, by which time they had rolled out of the top of a half loop, heading west once more. They still had a few gun rounds remaining but with only one engine they could never catch the Russian bombers again in order to expend them.

“Oh shit, oh shit… is it out, please tell me it is out!” Chubby was ashen faced in the back as he struggled to see if flames were licking out behind them. Once satisfied that they weren’t going to be barbecued he turned back, slumped in his seat.

“Fuck me… cheated death again… jeez I’m good!”

“What about the driver?” Nikki prompted.

“What?… Oh her!..I guess she qualifies as suitable to bear me many warrior sons.”

They discussed what to do next, they couldn’t head back to the John F Kennedy while an air raid was in process, they were likely to be targeted by their own sides missiles. So they elected to orbit where they were until they got the all clear from the carrier to come on home.

Two of the surviving Migs attempted to attack the outlying picket ships with cannon, but were splashed by SM1-MR missiles, and the remainder ran for home. They knew what was coming and wanted a lot of distance between them and the ships.

The Backfires were carrying four AS-17 sea skimmers each and on the command of the senior regimental commander, they launched them all together. Eighty missiles accelerated towards the ships 30 miles away, seventy-four carried 380lb conventional warheads, and six carried 500kt nuclear warheads, the bomb that had devastated Hiroshima was only 20kt in yield.

Four aircraft from the shipping strike were down on the deck of the John F Kennedy when the air defence missiles started to fly from the picket ships. Five minutes later the Aegis cruisers USS Vincennes and USS Chancellorville, just a few miles to landward of the John F Kennedy began firing; they emptied their magazines in just four minutes.

Admiral Dalton deliberately ignored the plots and screens; it was all beyond his control now. He was stood with his hands behind his back, watching the TV screen as a Tomcat approached on finals when the bow and stern Phalanx guns began to fire. The picture disappeared, two thousandths of a second before the great warship herself did, along with eleven other warships and their entire ships companies.

No satellites were overhead during the attack on the American carrier group, they had already passed over the horizon by the time the Russian strike had arrived. The machines witnessed a temporary dawn over the horizon; it was far more brilliant than usual as three temporary suns were born within a second of each other.

In the war room shelter at space command, audible alarms sounded as the photonic flashes were measured for intensity and came up atomic in source.

When the next satellite passed over the Kamchatka Peninsula, the typhoon had disappeared as though it had never existed. The water vapour that powered it had been boiled off and the sky was a cloudless blue.

In California, British Columbia, Hawaii and besieged Japan, geological survey equipment to measure the planets seismic activity registered the detonations.

There was no sign of the American and British warships, the only vessels that remained were the surviving fleet replenishment ships far to the south. They had parted company with the warships when they had emptied their holds of munitions, and were now headed to the Hawaiian Islands to replenish. Satellite transmissions from the warships had ceased at exactly the same moment the orbiting sensors detected the nuclear detonations.

The enemy ships remained, although there were four less than before and others showed the damage resulting from near misses by Harpoons and direct hits from the much smaller anti-radiation missiles. Even worse was the scene in the bay, where the carriers and two destroyers were making ready to get underway once more.

The Premier of the People’s Republic of China, and the Premier of the new Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, verbally slapped one another on the back in a rare videoconference between the two.

It did not matter to either man that the USSR presented a clutch of medals to some new Heroes of the Soviet Union, and declared the battle a Russian victory, or that the late Chinese Admiral Li was proclaimed the architect of China’s mastery of arms over America.

By late afternoon Lt Chubby Checkernovski was becoming very concerned for his pilot. Their Tomcat had been facing southwest when the false dawn had turned to daylight, with an intensity that had them slapping down the thick green visors on their flight helmets. It was as if they were flying directly at the sun, even though the light was behind them, so harshly brilliant that both had been left blinking to clear the after-images from their eyes, once it faded.

They were 67 miles from the outer screen of ships when the blast wave struck them, by which time it was but a murmur of its original force. Nikki fought to level their wings in the most violent turbulence either could remember, and when calm returned, they had gained over six thousand feet in altitude.

Both aviators had been too stunned to speak at first, Chubby had tried to raise first the John F Kennedy on the secure, directional beam before he had switched to Guard and listened to the static. Finally he dialled up each squadrons distress beacon frequency, listening for survivors in the water. All were silent.

With only fifteen minutes fuel remaining they had debated making landfall before punching out, to escape and evade, but neither really thought much of that one. It would take them two years and then some, to walk to Germany as they evaded capture and starvation, every step of the way.

The very faint likelihood that a ship would pick them up, and its crew could be persuaded to head for the states, held better odds. Say, 300,000 to 1 in fact!

They punched out at 5,000’ at barely above a stall, but even in those favourable conditions Nikki had been unconscious when she hit the water. Chubby had managed to paddle his one-man life raft over to her but it had taken a half dozen attempts, and all his reserves of energy, to drag her into her own life raft. He had only achieved it by tying a line from his own raft to his wrist and diving, or rather flopping into the water. He couldn’t believe what a dead weight an unconscious person could be, even one as petite as Nikki. The damn life raft of hers kept shooting away whenever he tried to get her head and shoulders over its side. Eventually he had gotten into her raft, placed his feet against the inflated side of a narrow end, reached forward, grabbed her under the arms and leant back, straightening his body as he did so. The action drove the end of the raft down below the surface and in the end he was lying beneath the pilot in a completely swamped life raft. He had struggled out from beneath her and back into the frigid water, before mooring the two rafts side by side and bailing both out, after which he lay exhausted for a full hour. He had seen the deep rent in the back of her flight helmet soon after he had first reached her, and as he lay in his raft he debated whether or not to remove the helmet, to see what damage was visible. Eventually he elected to leave it on; it may have been providing some tiny measure of insulation against the cold. If she had a skull injury it would require the skills of a surgeon to treat, and Chubby could just about manage a sticky plaster on a cut thumb.

It was now after three in the afternoon and Nikki had a pulse but that was about the only sign of life she showed. He was shivering with the cold and thirstier than he could ever remember when he heard a voice. It was difficult to look around without tumbling out of the raft and he didn’t exactly have a panoramic view, as the swells improved his range of vision, the troughs reduced it.

Eventually he saw another life raft as the waves briefly synchronised to raise them all at the same time. The strange raft was of a different design to that of the Americans; it was larger, circular and enclosed, providing more protection from the elements. Chubby had thought to take out his tiny survival compass, to get a bearing on whoever had shouted, always providing it wasn’t his mind playing tricks on him in the first place. The other raft was about a hundred meters to the north but he was unable to paddle towards it, with both rafts tied together he only succeeded in turning in a circle.

After an hour the other raft was closer though, its larger area allowed the wind to act on it, pushing it along and he recognised the Scots Sea Harrier pilot. Sandy Cummings had his head down as he leant out of an opening, industriously using a length of driftwood as a paddle to steer them together.

The first hint of dusk had arrived and it seemed the Scotsman’s raft would overtake theirs, passing a good fifteen feet to the west, but the Scotsman dived in, towing the raft behind him. Before long the Royal Navy pilot was in trouble, the wind was pushing his raft south whilst he was now swimming almost due north, his strength failing fast. Tying his own raft’s painter around his waist, Chubby flopped over the side and swam toward the pilot. They reached one another but it seemed they both must drown; the cold seas leeched the strength from muscles, and the will to fight on from their spirits. It took a last supreme effort to gain the side of the larger life raft, where Chubby had to combine his strength with the pilots to heave him aboard.

It was dark before Nikki’s still form was pulled inside the protective canopy along with the meagre survival stores from the American rafts. It was cramped inside with the three of them, but once it was done the two men bailed out the excess water and sealed up the opening against the wind. Working in the dark they stripped Nikki naked before the Scotsman extracted a survival blanket from his own rafts stores, and between them they wrapped it around the unconscious female. Sandy ordered Chubby to strip and climb in next to her, sharing his warmth.

They had left her helmet on until then, but now Sandy cracked one of their tiny stock of chemical light sticks and set to work.

“She has a lump on the back of the head but the skins not broken… I think its concussion and shock, the cold hasn’t helped either, we could lose her in the night Chubby, exposure may have set in, see how blue her lips are?” There were two chemical ‘hot pads’ in the life raft stores, small plastic envelopes that reacted to the air and heated up, once their seals were broken. Sandy stripped off his flight suit and under clothing before unsealing the raft and wringing out all their garments as best he could and then zipping up again. He activated the pads and squirmed his way under the survival blanket, on Nikki’s other side. The two men wedged the pads between their bodies and hers before they settled in for a long uncomfortable night.

The 1000’ long antennae had been streamed almost two hours’ before any transmissions, pertinent to the vessel, had been received. HMS Hood had precisely five torpedoes remaining before she became redundant, and the nearest replacements were in the Hawaiian Islands, at Pearl Harbour. Her Captain had wanted to head for Japan to rearm but the naval base was under near constant missile attack and COMSUBPAC, the USNs commander submarines, Pacific, had waved them off. Within a day and a half a single Seawolf class, US attack submarine would be on station; another was enroute from Pearl. Royal Navy Captains are not privy to their own Admiralty’s strategies and the Hood’s commander was certainly not privy to the US Navy Departments machinations, so he could only guess at where the Pacific submarine fleet was, certainly not in the North Pacific, that was for sure.

The USA had minimal land forces in Japan anyway, and soon they would be gone along with air and sea assets. US shipping in the Pacific had been federalised and ordered into ports in South Korea and Japan, the submarines were going to protect the sea-lanes from those ports to Australia, and only then could they venture forth and sink ships as they were supposed to do.

She was two hundred miles away from the John F Kennedy group when the carrier and her escorts had been destroyed; but water is a better medium than air for carrying sound and they heard the combat group die.

Hood and come out to the Pacific as part of the same flag waving exercise as Prince of Wales, Malta and Cuchullainn, and now was the sole surviving warship. Their orders requested them to return to the area, not so much to search for survivors as to show that they had tried. The Captain knew that it was a more humanitarian task, on behalf of the thousands of next of kin and loved ones, rather than a mission with a solid military purpose. For that reason he had been given a way out, room to refuse so as to rearm and continue war patrols, but he knew some of the wives and families and he knew he would have to look them in the eye again one day.

HMS Hood reeled in the floating antennae and came about, diving to 400’ and set a course of 315’ as he informed the crew of their task. They would be using their periscope far more often than was healthy, laying them open to detection from sensitive radars and MAD passes, where aircraft fly low, looking for their instruments to detect magnetic anomalies and twitch, telling them a submarine was close to the surface.

Lt Col Pat Reed MC, arrived at a muddy track junction in some woods to take command of the 1^st Battalion Coldstream Guards, or rather the two hundred and eleven officers and men that remained who were fit for duty.

He brought with him forty-seven Coldstreamers as replacements, along with two hundred and eighty-eighty paratroopers of the American 82^nd Airborne battalion that had fought its way back to NATO lines at Leipzig. For a time at least, the remnants of two proud battalions would fight together as a single unit with himself as the commander, and a major from the 82^nd as the 2 i/c.

The Guards RSM, Barry Stone, or ‘Baz the Raz’ to the boys had taken a Warrior to meet them on the road seven miles away, in order to guide them in. The new CO and the American troops arrived in Bundeswehr, German Army trucks, and introductions were made all round.

Major Jim Popham was the senior surviving 82^nd officer; Regimental Sergeant Major Arnie Moore was his right hand man. Both Americans carried injuries from the fight at the airport which should have excused them from combat for a while, had they not left the aid station as soon as the grenade fragments had been removed and the wounds cleaned. The four of them shared the Warrior that guided them to this spot, during the journey Lt Col Reed grilled the RSM as to what had occurred beside the river, what was now required and how were the troops. He had already read the reports and had been briefed by an officer from division, now he wanted to hear it from someone who had been there.

The RSM and the new CO had soldiered together before, so the RSM pulled no punches.

“A lot of the boys have captured AKMs secreted away; the LSWs let us down… quite badly. The section gunners binned them when we pulled out, which was about four hours’ after the last one stopped working. We ran out of reloads for the Milan’s and we ran out of NLAWs too. It wasn’t that their artillery prevented replen’s being brought up, their guns were knocked out for nearly two hours’. The MOD knew we would be fighting lots of armour, yet we didn’t have nearly enough. It was their artillery that did the damage initially, the tactic of our own holdings its fire until their armour committed was bollocks, sir. They hammered us, killed a lot of men and screwed up command and control, they should have counter battery’d sooner, much sooner. The boys in the reverse slope got hit heavily by mortars, where the guns couldn’t reach, but they didn’t have as many of those as they had guns, the guns slaughtered the depth positions. We don’t know what happened to Colonel Hupperd-Lowe, once the barrage stopped he went forward, he may have been at the 1 Company CP when an airstrike took it out”

The colonel was listening intently,

“Did many get left behind, there must have been some trapped in shelter bays?”

“There is no way of telling, I just hope those who dig themselves out screw the bobbin, and think to evade right from the off sir. The enemy isn’t taking prisoners; they even kill the wounded.”

The new commanding officer was watching the RSMs eyes, he knew without asking that that he had witnessed something that angered and haunted him.

“What’s their mood, any quitters?”

“We had a handful who were ineffective after the shelling stopped, but the boys fought until we had to pull out, no one quit and they are ready for round two.” He looked at the colonel before continuing, “They are pissed off at the shiny arses in Whitehall giving them crap… again, you may see another 1918 march on Parliament when this is over!”

Major Popham was curious about the reference and the CO explained.

“The Guards are renowned for their discipline, but politicians have managed to upset us to the point that we have, on a couple of hushed up occasions, said ‘Enough is enough!’ In 1918 we marched on Parliament with bayonets fixed.” The American raised his eyebrows and the CO smiled.

“It got their attention.”

When the Americans were discussing an organisational problem between themselves, the RSM spoke quietly to the new CO.

“We do have one problem sir, its one I personally feel strongly about, by way of an alleged discipline matter.” RSM Stone said.

“RSM, any break down of discipline in time of war is something I am inclined to come down hard on… .… wait, you said alleged, please be specific?”

“When the battalion command post was taken out, 1 and 2 Company’s had not been given the order to withdraw, although CSM Probert… … .you remember Colin Probert sir?” The CO nodded in affirmation.

“Company Sarn’t Major Probert had been given his orders by Major Sinclair to cover the companies as they fell back, only Major Manson refused to accept his word, even when it was obvious the CP was gone.” He outlined how the CSM had bluffed 2 Company’s commander and the new CO was nodding in approval.

“So what is Major Manson’s problem then?”

“Sir, he has since learnt the truth and placed the CSM in close arrest, awaiting charges of cowardice under fire.” The RSM withdrew an audiocassette and a Walkman from a pocket.

“I took the liberty of going over to the brigade signals intelligence detachment, they taped the entire battle of course, our transmissions and theirs. I respectfully suggest you listen to this copy sir, before Major Manson has his say.”

The CO went very still whilst he listened, and then replayed it twice more before muttering.

“That man was an insufferable prig when I last knew him… still thinks he is the lord of the manor, no doubt!" He realised he had spoken aloud and looked sternly at the RSM.

“You did not hear me say that, do you understand, Sarn’t Major?”

“Sir!” was the RSMs only reply.

On arrival at the battalions harbour area, all the commanders of the battalion and attached arms, units and sub units were waiting. Lt Col Reed saw straight away that there was more NCOs present, as acting platoon commanders, than there were junior officers. He had the nominal roll of who was MIA, WIA, KIA and those remaining, but seeing it for himself, with his own eyes, was rather different.

The new CO explained that the battalion was going into action at dawn tomorrow, as four under-strength rifle companies and a large mortar platoon, along with the remainder of 3(UK) Mechanised Brigade. 2(UK) Mechanised Brigade had been forming up over the last five days to the west, and was now enroute to join them. 1(UK) Armoured Brigade would be entering Germany in four days, by which time they had to have cleared out the Russian airborne division from Leipzig. He was aware of the LSWs shortcomings, as were all infantrymen, so he had brought out from the UK thirty-two gimpys. The SA-80 was in short supply as reserve stocks ran out so reserve war stocks were being dug into and he had two hundred SLRs, ammunition, bayonets and magazines, rescued from museums and the like. The older Guardsmen’s faces lit up like it was Christmas.

Lt Col Reed then dismissed all but the 2 Company commander, telling all the remaining company commanders, Hussars squadron commander, forward air, artillery and mortar platoon commanders to return in 30 minutes for an O Group. The US airborne troops went to stow their equipment on their new modes of transport, the British Warrior AFVs, and familiarise themselves with them and get to know their drivers, who were all Coldstream Guardsmen.

Once the others had departed, Major Manson approached the CO, all smiles and hand held outstretched.

“Patrick, so good to see you again… I cannot tell you how happy I was to hear you were taking over!” Which was hardly the truth, as Major Manson had cherished the hope that as the senior surviving officer he would be promoted to carry on as CO of the battalion. He paused when the proffered hand was not taken, and after a moment withdrew it.

“Why don’t you tell me what happened during the withdrawal, Major?”

Manson had rehearsed his version many times, since learning of the death of Major Sinclair before the withdrawal order had reached him.

“I take it that the RSM has already spoken to you, understandable I suppose as it is a serious discipline matter.” The CO did not make any remark; he remained standing, awaiting the Majors explanation.

“We were holding the enemy below the crest of the hill, when Probert came on the air, in a dead funk… obviously panicking and ranting that we had to get out before it was too late. Apparently the battalion CP had just been hit and it had rattled the man completely… shame really, I thought he was made of sterner stuff, obviously just a front.” He paused to take in the CO, the man’s face was impassive, giving nothing away.

“Well I realised that as senior officer it was all up to me to get the battalion out, discipline was going to pot but I managed, somehow… lord knows how I managed it, to settle everyone down… after which I gave a set of quick orders for the withdrawal… Otherwise we really would have been overrun. I kept the battalion together whilst we made a fighting withdrawal.”

“It sounds like a fine job of leadership on your part Major.”

Major Manson shrugged depreciatively.

“It’s what they pay me for Patrick.”

“It also sounds like total and utter… bollocks!”

“I say… steady on old man!”

“Shut up… and stand to attention when you are in my presence, you despicable reptile!” Colonel Reed was leaning forwards and his jaw set with anger. He withdrew the Walkman from his pocket and held it in plain view of the officer before him.

“When I first heard this radio intercept, I assumed that you had the CSM arrested in a fit of annoyance, that a mere ranker… had told you how to do your job. But I now see you tried to make personal capital out of a situation where many better men than you died. You saw it as a career opportunity … and… attempted to ruin a man’s reputation and career in so doing.” Reed was furious, he had envisioned admonishing the major for not being man enough to admit his own faults, but he had uncovered a vindictive and dishonest officer, clearly unfit to lead troops.

“Colonel, sir… I related to you the events as I recalled them… in the heat of battle, things get confusing… ”

“Shut your mouth… I won’t have you in my battalion… I won’t have you in my fucking regiment a second longer than I can manage!” He brushed past the major, calling for the RSM, who appeared from behind a nearby tree, the picture of innocence.

“RSM, who is the senior Captain?”

“That would be Captain Llewellyn sir, Mortar Platoon.”

“My compliments to Captain Llewellyn, and he is now OC number 2 Company… once you have done that have someone collect this officers weapon, ammunition and any battalion equipment he has on signature and that includes rations. He is reporting to brigade for reassignment and will make his own way there.” The RSMs broad grin did not appear until he was out of sight of the CO.

Major Manson was ashen faced.

“How am I supposed to get there, its forty odd miles away?”

The CO looked at him.

“Try asking somebody who gives a shit,” and walked away, leaving the man stood alone on the muddy track.

The clear skies of the previous day had reverted to a thin overcast of cloud. Nikki had survived the night and had come too twice, only to lapse into unconsciousness once more. The sea was gentler at the moment, as it had been for most of the day and the trio’s garments had dried, tied as they were to a thick handling strap, which ran across the roof of the raft. They could do nothing about the salt that stained them a washed out colour and remained in the fibres of the clothing, it irritated the skin but at least they were warmed once they had donned them again. Nikki had been redressed and left wrapped in the survival blanket. Earlier, Sandy had awoken from a fitful sleep feeling nauseous and worried that it could be radiation sickness. Chubby did not think so, they were miles to the west of the detonations and the wind was blowing south, as it usually did in these climes.

With the coming of daylight, they had taken stock of their meagre supplies. The raft had a tiny still, that filtered seawater into the drinkable variety but it was painfully slow, producing just a thimbleful every two hours’. Food was another worry, they had at most just three days’ worth so had, after much debate, used the survival kits fishing line and hook, baited with a pickled pilchard which had so far been ignored by its live kin.

The flyers rescue beacons had been switched off, they were unaware of any friendly forces anywhere close enough to be able to effect a rescue, but they were aware that the enemy would probably be monitoring every frequency, they did not want to fall into their hands.

The day was spent checking on Nikki in between Sandy’s introducing Chubby to Blackadder fanhood, even offering to demonstrate the making of Private Baldrick’s alternative cappuccino… the offer was hurriedly declined!

Smoke and dust reduced visibility for the Russian paratroopers manning the forward OP beyond the autobahn junction. NATO had been pounding their positions every thirty minutes with an hours’ worth of shelling, for the last twenty-four hours’. Inside the OP, the Russian on watch glanced at the timepiece on his wrist; it was about time for the enemy guns to make their presence known again. The burnt out hulks of a pair of Marder APCs and two Leopard II MBTs sat out to their front, along with over a hundred corpses, resulting from the Germans only effort so far to dislodge them. Their division had landed with beefed up 2B11, 120mm mortar assets, six batteries of 122mm D-30 howitzers, and thirty of the light PT-76 tanks, which had been unloaded from IL-76 transports before NATO reorganised in the air. Of the thirty-nine mixed ZSUs that the plan called for, only nine had been delivered. The remainder had been on transports that had turned back in the face of renewed NATO air superiority. The Su-37 cover had been disjointed by air refuelling problems and the resupply airlift was haphazard at best. The armour, guns and AAA that had not made it in, were now sat on the edge of an airfield, along with two field hospitals and their staffs, because ammunition now had priority, except that there wasn’t much making it in. NATO had IR sensors for its AAA too, and a lot of it was plotted up around the city. The Russian stealth fighters could defeat radar but not the heat seekers, and the lumbering Il-76 transports had to get right down on the deck in order to get through. The transports did not fly like crop-dusters and had no terrain following radar; four that had attempted the feat were now smeared across hillsides.

There were four men manning the OP, all experienced soldiers and good at their job, which was staying out of sight and reporting on all enemy movement. The OP had been sited to observe where an enemy would ideally form up before an attack on their positions a thousand or so metres behind them. The only practical spot was at the bottom of an embankment, in an autobahn service's car park, which was out of sight of the Russian forward fighting positions, and accessed by a service road in dead ground.

If the paratroopers in the OP had made a mistake, it was in calling down artillery on the German troops and armour whilst they were in the service area.

German GSG9 troopers in their military role now, rather than anti-terrorist, had spent over a day in snipers ‘ghillie suits’ sniffing out the OP. In fairness to the Russians, they had been rather limited by the terrain in their choice as to where they could site the observation post. The OP was on its own; it did not have another post watching its back, so there were no Mk 1 eyeballs covering their ‘6’, just electronic ones. Small, telescopic masts that looked a lot like natural vegetation created a photoelectric fence that ringed the blind spot at the rear, where the OP could not see. The GSG9 troopers, who had discovered the masts knew the OP was nearby, and very carefully removed soil so as to create a man-sized gully, which allow them to crawl under the ‘fence’ and search beyond it. When the OP itself was found they placed several items on, and around it. For the past six hours’ every whisper the paratroopers made had been recorded, they knew the paratroopers names and the style of VP, voice procedure that they used on the field telephone. The Russians had radios and cellular phones, but the radios were not in use for security reasons and the cellular’s had no ‘whisper’ facility that would allow them to speak into them in hushed tones yet still be heard normally at the other end.

The Germans were now ready and had four men 100m from the OP, all of whom listened to the first shells pass overhead and waited for them to land on the enemy blocking position. As the sound of the detonating shells reached them, one of the troopers pressed the button on a small transmitter.

Four half-pound charges of PE, plastic explosive, blew off the OPs turf and earth roof and killed or seriously injured the occupants, who were in no position to resist when the GSG9 troopers sprinted up and emptied their G3 assault rifles magazines into them.

The Russians had buried their field telephone landline, it was now located and a German telephone attached in place of the now smashed Russian equipment.

With the OP neutralised, the first British armoured vehicles began arriving in the service area five minutes later, 3 (UK) Mechanised Brigade had been blooded in a defence posture, it was now about to go into the attack.

Orbiting at 49,000’ east of the autobahn junction, in the clear but moonless sky, Spirit One dropped its single item of ordnance and continued its circular track, as it 'lasered' the aiming point below. There was only one squadron of operational B2 bombers, and this was the unit of bat-like stealth bombers first mission of the war. NATO signals intelligence had been listening diligently for the Russian airborne division’s radio traffic, and found… silence. In order to get some kind of picture as to where the Russians were in the Leipzig area, they had to DF, direction find, their transmissions, as well as carry out ground and aerial recce’s. The answer to this apparent silence was quite simply that the enemy was utilising the cities still active cellular system by using mobile phones to communicate. In a city filled with people still using phones, but unable to phone outside the city, it was impossible to separate the chaff from the wheat.

The 2000lb laser guided ‘Bunker Buster’ would penetrate 60 feet below ground before detonating and destroying both cellular and landline communications, bringing down the thirty-two floors of the Leipzig telephone exchange at the same time. The Russian forces would have no option but to switch on their radios and NATO could then locate the transmitters, as well as make life generally difficult by jamming their transmissions.

In their fighting positions at the autobahn, the paratroopers exchanged glances as the NATO barrage continued beyond its usual hours’ worth. They were all tired from the lack of sleep that sixteen hours’ of shelling in the last twenty-four had brought. The company commander at the autobahn called his forward OP, a hand clamped to his free ear in order to hear above the noise of bursting shells, but was reassured by the answer he received. His command post was constructed of concrete rubble, and wooden fence posts removed from the nearby fields supported the roof, giving the occupiers roughly 4 feet of headroom. It would have been wide enough to hold four men, but two manpack radios occupied one side with their antennae’s poking up through the rubble roof. Vision was courtesy of a 6”x3” slit at the far end facing the expected threat. The ground trembled and bucked with the impacts, and shrapnel lashed the air. This barrage was keying up the troops to await an attack that may materialise, but so far none had. The enemy were indulging in psychological warfare with them, seeking to wear them down, reflected the company commander, it was working too. He replaced the handset and rolled to one side, lifting a nightscope to peer west along the empty autobahn.

The paratrooper who acted as the company commanders runner, orderly and general dogsbody, the all necessary ‘gopher’, was heating water for coffee in a mess tin. Because of the dust and grit that filled the air, he had a larger mess tin held over the filled vessel to keep the crap out of it, so his attention was on his present task. Two minutes later he poured the hot water onto coffee powder and crawled up the shelter to his officer, who appeared to be resting.

He did not see the broken glass until he put his weight on his left hand.

“Ubl'yudok!” Bastard, he cursed and set the mug in his right hand down, whilst he plucked the shard out. He hadn’t noticed the glass in the past couple of days, so he looked for the source and found a smashed nightscope. It was an instinctive reaction that made him look out through the vision slit, for the assumed shell crater that had been associated with the damaged scope. As his face came into view Big Stef put a round into one of his eyes as well, before changing his firing position and looking for more firing slits near radio antennae’s.

The full weight of the NATO guns focused on the junction for twenty minutes, and did not lift until the advancing Challengers and Warriors 120mm and 30mm cannon were taking the enemy strong points under direct fire, and the Guardsmen had deployed from the AFVs and began to skirmish forward in the assault.

Whilst the Coldstreamers two rifle companies led the assault on the Russian forward positions, the American paratroops followed on behind, where they could pass through the Guards and come to grips with their Russian counterparts in the depth positions beyond.

Mention ‘skirmishing’ to a British infantryman, and his eyes will not show wild enthusiasm. The infantrymen work in pairs, one will put down covering fire whilst his oppo rolls to one side, gets up and moves forward in a jinking run, drops, rolls again and puts down covering fire while his mate then moves up. The distance run is calculated by the time that it takes for a good opponent to select a target, aim and fire, which is about three seconds. You roll before getting up in case the enemy noted where you were firing from, and has drawn a bead on the spot, waiting for you to get up. You roll when you get down at the end of your forward rush, in case the enemy noted where you disappeared from sight and is waiting for you to stick your head up behind your weapon to commence covering fire. bergens are dropped before skirmishing takes place but it still leaves you carrying a hell of a lot of gear and it is absolutely knackering. It takes a fair few, three-second dashes to cover even a hundred metres.

A favourite way of the Brecon instructors to judge the quality of their latest batch of student’s is to get them into full NBC protective kit and skirmish them up the side of the Brecon Beacons. The exercise continues until the instructors can see the levels of vomit reach the bottom of the visors, inside the masks. The practice is best filed under ‘Character building’ in the filing cabinet of life’s rich tapestry.

With the Warriors rapid firing 30mm cannon and the infantry gun group gimpy’s providing solid fire support, the Guards skirmished to within yards of the Russian positions. Section commanders kept their men on the ground there briefly by holding up a fresh magazine and a bayonet, which were then placed on the elderly but reliable SLRs. Since British infantry first formed line and fixed bayonets a few hundred years ago, they have been regarded as the best at wielding a weapon tipped with sharp metal fashioned in Sheffield, and with a bit of guts behind it too, of course.

Almost winded by getting that far, apprehensive at probably never having done this before for real, the Guardsmen closed the gap between themselves and their enemy, still skirmishing but now only kneeling to fire.

“Don’t bunch!” screamed the section commanders at their riflemen, as they started to gang up on enemy positions, making themselves easy targets for machine guns. The section commanders were also looking over their shoulders at the rear and holding up clenched fists, the signal for their gun groups. Now that the riflemen were too close for the gunners to safely continue providing cover, they needed to be brought up. Once the gun group commanders acknowledged the signal, the commanders pointed at where they now wanted them. The ‘number one’, the gunner, carried out a rapid make-safe of the gun, snapped the belt of linked ammunition about thirty rounds down and made off at a dead run with the gimpy inverted and reversed on his shoulder. The number two and the gun group commander bringing up the boxes of linked, the bags containing spare barrels and the cleaning/tool kit.

The L1A1 SLR is a semi-automatic, gas and spring operated, self-loading rifle, which means it is not an automatic weapon, but there is always a round ready to go provided there are rounds in the magazine. The longer length, 44.5” was more suited than the carbine sized SA-80 for bayonet fighting, and the Guardsmen now used it to take cold steel to the Russians with gusto and a roar. Grenades did not always precede the way, there were plenty of suitably sized lumps of rubble to hand to encourage the enemy to quit their fire trenches and meet the British above ground when these ‘grenades’ landed at the feet of the trenches occupants.

An SLR has a distinctive metallic ringing undertone when it is fired; rapidly expanding gases propel the bullet up the barrel, where half way along some of the gases find an aperture. Still expanding, the gases are channelled by the groove in the gas plug and encounter the head of a spring-loaded piston, which is forced back by the pressure. The foot of the piston in turn pushes back the breech block and slide that compose the working parts, continuing even after the hinged tail at rear of the working parts encounters the head of the return spring in the rifles butt. As the working parts move back, an extractor lug ejects the spent case out of the right side of the weapon. Once the gases have pushed the piston all the way to the rear, a vent is uncovered and the gases dissipate, allowing the return spring to push the working parts forward again, collecting a fresh round from the magazine as it does so and pushing it into the breech. The pistons spring uncoils and propels the piston forward, where its head strikes the base of the gas plug producing the distinctive ringing sound. The entire operation takes less than half a second to complete, and the rifle is ready to fire again.

The sounds of firing SLRs, AKMs and the detonation of grenades took over as the AFVs targets were obscured by their own sides’ infantry. The Guardsmen knew what had happened to their mates, who’d been left behind at the river, and it didn’t matter to them that their enemy then had been Czech, they laid into the Russian paratroopers with a vengeance. There was not a single man involved that was not scared, and that went for both sides. No one would show fear to their mates as they threw grenades and rushed in whilst its shock effect still held good. They were frightened as they parried opponent’s thrusts and followed through with butt strokes or thrusts with the bayonet. They weren’t fighting for Queen and Country, nor even for ‘The Regiment’, they fought for each other.

With the shortage of officers, Sgt Osgood and CSM Probert were now each commanding rifle platoons, which were attacking in a two sections up, one back formation. As a trench was taken, it was occupied by the victors who then put down fire on the next position, covering their mates as they leap-frogged forward from position to position.

Oz was out of breath when the last of his platoons’ objectives had been taken. Muscles were threatening to turn to jelly as reaction set in, but he combated this by organising his sections to take the Russian in-depth positions under fire. The enlarged mortar platoon had kept that enemy occupied and unable to do more than risk the occasional shot in support of their forward positions. The Warriors and Challengers moved up and added their fire to that of the infantry as the two companies of the 82^nd Airborne showed the Brits that they were pretty good at this stuff too.

Earlier at the O Groups, there were smiles raised on the Toms faces when call signs had been given. The Americans had given their companies the call signs; Metal Falcon’s One and Two, which the CO thought was a bit too John Wayne-ish, so he had given himself the call sign ‘Rubber Duck’ and called his two Coldstream rifle companies, Plastic Chicken and Paper Parrot. Not since the Korean War had American and British units fought side by side. Both armies thought they were the best but had no real chance to prove it until today, although nobody was actually keeping a tally, holding a stopwatch or awarding marks for artistic merit. As dawn turned to daylight, both units held each other in genuine respect, with the taking of the Autobahn junction.

The Russians fought hard, with skill and not a little courage either, but for once they had been on the receiving end and it was forty minutes after the infantry assault began, before Russian shells began to arrive, and those batteries delivering them received swift response from NATO. As the Russian shelling died out, 2LI passed through the Guards and 82^nd Airborne to take on the next Russian positions, at the airport perimeter. To their right, 7^th/8^th Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders had won their fight too and the US paratroopers and British infantry heard the sound of bagpipes.

“Poor, poor bastards!” said Reed sadly. Major Popham looked at the colonel before peering into the distance, toward the sound.

“Is there a problem?”

“The Jocks are using their porridge guns on the Russians!” replied the colonel, as he listened to the distant strains of The Black Bear.

In Schkeuditz to the south of the junction, Senior Lieutenant of Paratroops Nikoli Bordenko received a quick set of orders from his company commander as their company was to pull out of their own battalions in-depth positions enroute to reinforce the battalion at the airport. Apparently word had only just arrived that the battalion there was about to be overrun and time was of the essence, so he gathered his men and they hurriedly boarded requisitioned civilian trucks.

The Mao and the Kuznetsov were making twenty six knots on a course of 180’ when Vice Admiral Putchev stepped out of the helicopter that had delivered him, once more to the Chinese flagship… Crouching low to avoid being beheaded, he hurried from the machine as it spooled up and lifted off the flight deck. Captain Hong saluted whilst smiling enthusiastically at the Russian naval officer.

“Welcome back, sir… how was your flight?”

“Interminable, we were an hour out of Vladivostok when I got my orders to come back. We had to continue in to refuel before returning, so I have been in the air for virtually twenty-four hours’ and my ass is numb.”

He paused to observe the welding going on above their heads. “American Harpoon, I have only heard about the battle second hand?” he queried.

Captain Hong led him to his cabin and explained about the submarine attack and the air strikes, which had been two separate battles, and fought on different days, contrary to the propaganda version.

The captain had already requested a more substantial submarine screen than they’d had previously, along with replacements for the frigates and destroyers that had been lost.

“So tell me Captain,” began the Russian Admiral.

“How long before the Americans use nuclear weapons on us, and where are the Americans other carriers and submarines?”

They had reached the Admirals cabin and a seaman opened the cabin door for them.

Inside they found that the previous occupant’s belongings were still in place, and Hong fired off some harsh words in rapid fire Cantonese at the seaman, demanding to know why the cabin was not ready for Vice Admiral Putchev. The seaman looked stricken when he replied, before dashing away.

“My wife speaks like that to me, usually when I have had too much vodka than is good for me… I couldn’t fathom what she say’s either, it was rather too fast for my European ear?” stated the Russian.

Hong apologised for the condition of the cabin.

“He has been engaged on repair duties and forgot. He asked where he should send the effects, I told him to dump them over the side, after he had removed any items of value for himself and his mess mates.”

“I take it that the late Admiral Li did not improve with age?”

The Chinese officer shook his head.

“You could say that… if you would accompany me to my cabin sir, I can properly brief you on events?”

Captain Hong knew that his own cabin was clear of any electronic surveillance by his own country’s or the Russians intelligence services.

The briefing took about three hours’ during that time the Russian listened intently and asked only pertinent questions, such as replacements for the lost aircraft. He was gratified to learn that even before the carriers had gone operational, the PLAN had implemented a training program for replacement pilots. Those joining would be better prepared than their predecessors had been. It was such a pleasant change from the former Admirals attitude, thought Hong. Now we can really show what we can do.

When the brigade assigned the task of seizing the city had landed in the city’s park there had been no opposition at first. Only a few die-hard lovers who refused to let something as trivial as a war cool their ardour, had been witness to the first sticks of paratroopers landing. As was his habit, the colonel general led from the front and was the first man on the ground, quickly followed by his staff. The landing had remained unopposed for fifteen minutes until four carloads of civilian police had arrived. The police officers had been dispatched after a short, rather one-sided fire fight, but during that time Alontov’s second in command had been shot through the throat and died moments later. His aide had landed on railings and been impaled through his left foot, which reduced the number of officers on the division’s staff capable of commanding it to one, Alontov himself.

Headquarters for the 6^th Guards Shock Army’s airborne division, was now situated in the sub-basement of the exclusive 18^th century Kempinski Hotel Fürstenhof, where a modest single room would set you back just $265 a night, provided of course you left the mini bar alone and brought your own sandwiches.

The signals unit had set up its communications equipment as soon as they had moved in, but they had not powered it up until that morning when their cell phones went down. A major entered the particular catacomb that Colonel General Alontov and what remained of his operations staff were occupying and saluted.

“The building is now empty apart from ourselves, sir.”

“You do not approve Stefan… I let the staff and guests stay whilst we were free of the need to use radios. They were in no danger then but they are now. Eventually NATO will stop shelling the antennae farms when they work out where we really are and we will have to leave, in the meanwhile they will do their level best to reduce this place to brick dust. Do you really think that the presence of civilians above our heads would stop them?”

“They were rich and pampered sir.”

“Stefan, rich and pampered people need armies to fight their wars for them, if you go killing them off you will put us all out of work… now come here” he instructed, pointing to the wall map. “NATO are at the airport perimeter, so as was predicted, the Germans managed to forestall their withdrawal and so I have sent the signal to begin the next phase.” He turned to his artillery rep, who had his headset and microphone glued to his head.

“Colonel, what are your ammunition stats?”

The colonel did not have to refer to anything in front of him.

“Five hundred rounds per tube were delivered, that is half of what was planned for. We do not have enough for counter battery fire, but at the present rate of expenditure we will run out in less than twenty-four hours’. This damned NATO jamming is making it difficult for me to keep track, but that is my estimate sir. There was no resupply last night and if they do not get through again tonight then I hope our comrades in the north hurry the hell up, sir.”

Alontov tapped the map, his finger was beating a tattoo over the airports western edge.

“As you are aware, the attack by NATO at dawn rolled over the battalion at the autobahn junction before word could reach us here. They are now at the airport perimeter. We can survive without the airport; the air force can drop their palettes over the park, but the airport sits beside a principal supply route and the road into the north of this city. They can have the south, once the bridges across the canals are blown… but I need a maximum effort from your guns Colonel. I am taking half of the brigade from this city, all the armour we have, and I am going to push those enemy forces back and retake our old positions at the junction, and I need artillery to do that.”

The artillery rep nodded before turning back to what he was doing before and began giving preparatory orders.

“Colonel Ostrovich.” The brigade commander for the city's forces smiled at him from the corner of the room his staff was using.

“I know general, you are stealing half of my command and lending me the division… whilst you go and pretend to be eighteen again.”

“Correct my friend, the enemy effort has just about spent itself at the airport. They will be digging in and waiting for fresh troops, probably the other British mechanised brigade, which will be here tomorrow. We must ensure they commit that brigade, because once it is they will not be able to use it to reinforce the NATO line before Berlin, where the 2^nd Shock Army and our Belorussian comrades will be heading quite soon.”

The brigade commander crossed the room and shook Alontov’s hand.

“9^th Battalion is already mounted up as mobile reserve, I will take two 7^th Battalion companies away from patrolling the streets and send them, plus their mortars to join you in thirty minutes… .take care Serge, we aren’t bullet proof young lieutenants chasing mountain tribesmen anymore!” he added with a note of caution.

Serge clapped him on the shoulder before striding to the door, where one of his men held out weapons and equipment for him to don.

Contrary to the colonel generals beliefs, 3 (UK) Mechanised had not dug in to consolidate the ground they had taken. Whilst the Russian commander was still speaking, 2LI had hacked a six hundred metre wide gap in the airports perimeter defences, which the Guards and US Airborne exploited by racing through to seize part of the cargo handling and warehouse area.

Nikoli Bordenko and a section of his men sprinted between buildings and drew fire from the bonded warehouse. Nikoli cursed as a tiny splinter of sharp concrete struck him below the left cheekbone and drew blood. The man beside him made a sound a like a punctured football being kicked, and dropped lifeless to the tarmac. The fallen man’s body tripped the soldier behind, who regained his feet and dived the last few feet to the safety of the buildings sold wall. The high velocity rounds passed them with high-pitched cracking sounds, or scarred and pitted the concrete and tarmac around them, kicking up shards of stone. The ricochets made humming sounds as the misshapen bullets spun away with a whine, the sounds of their passing diminishing with distance.

Now that the Russian paratroopers were no longer in view of the warehouse, the firing slackened off but did not die out completely.

The soldier who had stumbled was swearing as he examined the damage, a round had sliced open the back of his camouflaged trousers leaving a six-inch vertical rent. His left buttock was reddened around a long, shallow gash in the soft flesh, and he pulled apart the edges of the ripped cloth to view the injury.

“Shit, shit, shit!” Nikoli reached over and tugged at the underwear that was also exposed. The small, American flag and happy face design on the boxer shorts drew laughter from the rest of the soldiers. “Sergeant, I told you not to go into that wrecked gift shop yesterday, looting is a serious offence… and the Fashion Police around here would seem to have a licence to kill!” he told the injured man with a grin.

“Well fuck-you-very-much for your concern sir, but someone just gave me an instant third buttock!”

“Look on the positive side, sarge… ” another paratrooper added.

“It is an extra vent for all that bullshit you’re full of.”

“Just for that you sodding gobby Georgian, you can find us a way into this building… preferably without me getting shot at again!”

To a civilian, it may have seemed callous that they were laughing and joking just moments after a messmate had died. However, the laughter was partly nervous release and the dead man was not forgotten, because they would grieve for him silently once the adrenaline had settled and the fighting was done.

Three hundred metres away in the bonded warehouse, Colin Probert was handing out captured AKM-74 assault rifles and ammunition to his men.

“Use these until the ammunition runs out, save your own until then. Remember… single, aimed shots only, if anyone goes Audie Murphy on me he’ll catch my boot up his arse!” They had used a lot of ammunition and most of their grenades taking the place and needed to take advantage of whatever supplies were at hand. The enemy would counter-attack, probably sooner rather than later so bricks were being removed in the walls to allow them to engage the enemy and eliminate the number of blind spots about the place. Just removing bricks is not enough, a high velocity round will go straight through brickwork, with the exception of the SA-80s ammunition of course, and they needed to add some protection around the loops in the walls.

The Light Infantry’s breakthrough had been unexpected, and there had been a scramble to get men aboard AFVs and through the breach. Only four Warriors had reached the buildings before heavy mortar and artillery fire had isolated them here. They had lost five men dead and six wounded clearing out the Russians who had been here and in the building site behind, which left six US 82^nd troopers including their RSM, and twenty-one Guardsmen to hold on until the cavalry arrived.

In the time that the enemy had held the building, they had obviously helped themselves to some of its contents and the new occupants had thoughts along the same lines. When Arnie Moore and Colin had returned after gathering up the AKMs, they found British and Americans alike hurriedly doing up flaps on bergens.

“I’m not going to say anything,” Colin had begun.

“… so long as you can still carry your kit… without ditching any of your own equipment and without getting pissed.” By which he meant drunk rather than angry. However at that point there had been a shuffling sound and Guardsman Robertson and the other Tyneside ladies’ man, Aldridge, came huffing and puffing into view carrying an enormous boxed, widescreen television set, which according to the packaging came complete with a Surround Sound system, DVD, Blu Ray and Video. They’d frozen when they saw the two warrant officers looking directly at them.

“And just what may I ask, are you going to do with that thing?”

Both young soldiers spoke at once.

“It’s for me Mam… its ‘er birthday next week.” stammered Aldridge.

“It’s for me Granny, she’s an ‘undred t’morrer!”

Arnie Moore had chucked away to himself.

“Boy Colin, you sure do bring up your boys to look after the lady folk!” but Colin’s face showed no such amusement.

“Put it back where you found it, and do it now!” However, once they had shuffled and puffed back out of sight he’d allowed a big grin to spread across his face.

“When I joined the Second Battalion, 2CG, it was away in Cyprus and I got stuck on the rear party at Chelsea. The boys were in the thick of it as UN Peacekeepers, dug in on Nicosia airport between the Greek National Guard and the Turkish Paras. In the middle of the battalions territory was the bonded warehouse. I remember going to the docks at Southampton with the rest of the rear party to collect the heavy kit that wasn’t airlifted back by Herc’. We didn’t have Milan’s then, the anti-tanks were equipped with the 120mm ‘Combat’ a recoilless anti-tank gun, and damn great things they were. There were two customs officers stood with their backs to us on the edge of the dock, chatting away to each other and having a fag… that’s a cigarette mate, not someone who is light in the loafers. Anyway, a Combat was lowered onto the quayside in nets, and we were getting it unravelled, ready to hook up to a ‘rover, but the muzzle cap came off, and that barrel was stuffed with fags, camera lenses, bottles of Uzo and single malt that started to slide out. We were shovelling that stuff back in like men possessed, and the whole time those two customs men were just ten feet away.”

“The spoils of war, eh?” Arnie smiled.

“We don’t get combat pay in this man’s army, so I reckon I can turn a blind eye to a small amount of wealth re-distribution!”

Back in the present, a group of Russian paratroopers had run behind a nearby building, leaving one of their number lying motionless in plain view after the defenders opened up on them.

“Hurry up with that stuff!” The 82^nd’s RSM shouted at the two teams he’d detailed off, to utilise forklifts in fetching bags of cement from the building site. The cement bags were being stacked like sandbags inside the warehouse around the firing loops, which the 82^nd men called ‘forting up’, whilst the Brits called it sangar building.

There had been an unusual lull in the firing, which the Warrant Officers took as ominous. ‘Someone’s planning something nasty, I can bloody feel to it. Make sure you people get some top cover on those things, all kinds of shit is going to be falling on our heads otherwise.”

Three of the Warriors were in the building site, taking advantage of the additional protection afforded by stacked piles of building materials. The drivers and Rarden gunners had cammed up the vehicles by leaning sheets of plasterboard against the vehicles. From there they could cover the rear of the warehouse whilst the fourth Warrior was parked between stacked aircraft luggage containers at the side of the building, its barrel peeking between the stacks. The AFVs had been ordered not to open fire or reveal their presence unless it was an emergency, because no one else had appeared from the NATO lines to support them, and neither Moore nor Probert thought much of the ‘last man, last bullet’ option. If it got too hot, they would bug out, and it would be quicker and safer to ride back to friendly lines aboard the AFVs than it was to try running across 700m of flat, open ground.

Colin had tried to get some friendly air, mortars or artillery on line for when they needed it, but no one had made them any promises.

On the roof of the maintenance shed opposite the warehouse, three of Nikoli’s paratroopers had finished prying loose bricks with their bayonets and now had firing loops from which to fire down into the tiny NATO enclave. Down below, their comrades had done the same.

Nikoli himself was calling in a mortar fire mission on the warehouse, emphasising to the MFC, mortar fire controller on the other end, that he and his men were only 300m from the intended target. He wanted the first ‘belt’ of mortar rounds to be ‘over’ rather than ‘under’ when they landed. His other two sections were in the building they had left previously, and they would emerge and flank the right side of the warehouse once the mortars had the range. He cursed as NATOs white noise swamped the airwaves, and consulted a list before changing to the next frequency shown, once there he re-established contact with the mortars.

Hobbling up, his sergeant carefully lowered himself down onto a toolbox, taking care to rest just the right buttock on the hard surface.

“Are we set yet, sir?”

“Six minutes,” he replied and swung the short-range radio onto his back.

“Get them under cover in case those fools can’t shoot straight… call them down from the roof too, once the fires adjusted they can go back up.”

The next few minutes were a flurry of activity as drain covers were removed and the Russians, with the exception of Nikoli, took cover. The young lieutenant had to be in a position to observe the fall of shot, something that could not be achieved from below ground.

He could clearly hear the mortar rounds pass overhead and heard them exploding somewhere but couldn’t locate the fall of shot, there were too many buildings obstructing his view. The only thing to do was to ask them to repeat the shoot with smoke rounds this time and when they came in he spotted the smoke way off to the left and it took five adjustments before the warehouse was straddled.

“Right boys, get to work!” he shouted to the section that scrambled out of their holes and began firing through the loops they had made in the walls. The metal staircase rang with the sounds of three pairs of boots hurrying up to the roof. Once he heard them firing up above he changed frequencies and listened for a moment before shaking his head in frustration. The next frequency on his list was also being jammed so he changed for a second time, and ordered the remaining sections to begin their flanking attack.

By the time Colonel General Alontov arrived at the airport, one side of the bonded warehouse had collapsed outwards, dropping a portion of the roof into the building, but the defenders had beaten off the sustained efforts of the platoon of paratroopers under Nikoli’s command. Two Guardsmen and an 82^nd Trooper had been killed, whilst four more had been injured by enemy fire or falling building materials, the injured were all now aboard the Warriors. They had prevented the Russians from flanking them and left seven enemy paratroopers dead from the attempt.

Ammunition was beginning to worry Arnie Moore, despite his constantly controlling the fire being put down. As is the normal practice, the troops had been numbered off for ease of command and control; he had a voice saving device in his hand in the form of a compressed air operated rape alarm. The high pitched shriek of the alarm was audible even to the machine gunners in mid burst, and they would cease-fire and listen out for his commands.

“Even numbers… go on!” After about thirty seconds he would depress the top of the alarm again and order the odd numbers to continue, and thus far they had managed to conserve ammunition as well as they could and keep the remaining Russians heads down.

Colin had confined himself to the radio, trying to drum up some support of the physical kind, i.e., troops to help them enlarge their foothold within the airport perimeter. The mortar fire coming in on they had ceased abruptly when an A-10 Thunderbolt wasted the enemy mortar line responsible, but that had been chance, rather than Colin’s doing.

“Hello Sunray Three One, this is Zulu Three One Alpha, over.” The ‘Zulu’ denoted a vehicle empty of its troops; in this case it was the Warrior at the corner of the building, which was calling him up.

“Sunray Three One, send over?” answered Colin. ‘Sunray’ is the name for a unit or sub-units commander and the CSM was now the acting platoon commander of No. 1 Platoon, 3 Company.

“Zulu Three One Alpha, we see figures four Papa Tango Seventy-Twos and figures six Bravo Mike Papas headed your way, over!”

“Three One roger… all Zulus standby to collect your call signs and Foxtrot Oscar.” he rolled to the side and stuck his head out the back of his tiny sangar before calling out to Arnie.

“Regimental Sarn’t major… !”

When Arnie’s face appeared, Colin gave him the thumbs down gesture, the sign for ‘enemy’.

“Armour and APCs coming our way… our carriages await us to foxtrot oscar, pee dee quu!”

Arnie nodded. “I’ll stay with my guys until you get mounted!” but Colin shook his head.

“My wagons closest sir, I’ll keep my section here until I hear that thing in your hand, then we’ll bug out.”

It was the practical thing to do and Arnie nodded in agreement.

Colin dragged the radio out of his sangar and pulled it onto his back as he crawled across to the section of Coldstreamers from his vehicle.

“Lance Sarn’t Daid, give it some!”

He let the section commander give the order for rapid fire and twisted his head to watch as RSM Moore shepherded the remainder out of the back door.

Colin hand his rifle to the gimpy gunner.

“Gimme the gun… get them moving lance sarn’t, I’ll be right behind you.”

The first BMP and light tank appeared as they ran for the door, and Colin aimed short bursts at their vehicle commanders’ heads, which were peering out in the direction of the rather battered warehouse, before he turned and sprinting for the far doorway.

He didn’t hear the light tanks main gun fire, but its shell entered the front of the warehouse through a gap in the brickwork and struck a weakened roof support at the back. Colin found himself sat on his backside and choking on the dust and smoke from the explosion that had collapsed of the roof at the back end of the building. He could see enough to know that the only way out was through the front, under the Russian guns.

“All stations Three One, from Sunray, I’m screwed… bug out, NOW!”

His soldiers’ instincts were to come back and try to extract him, but he was a company sergeant major and they were the Guards, which meant that you did as you were told at the time and bitched about it later.

Popping smoke, the Warriors beat feet for friendly lines whilst keeping the warehouse between themselves and the enemy AFVs.

Colin looked at the belt on the gun; he had about fifteen rounds remaining although he still had one full magazine in his left pouch. He crawled back the way he had come and gathered up discarded links, ejected from the gimpy along with the empty cases. It hardly made much difference to his chances, five short bursts worth, but on emptying his magazine he hurriedly linked up the twenty rounds into a belt, that he then clipped to the end of the one already on the gun, after that he just waited.

After throwing smoke, Nikoli, his platoon, and one other closed in on the wrecked warehouse. All the loops made in the walls by the NATO troops had received a round apiece from the BMPs 23mm cannons.

He had been prepared to request that the building be flattened; rather than lose any more good men, however, the divisional commander himself was on scene and wanted prisoners.

On reaching the comparative safety on the front wall without taking casualties, Nikoli’s unwelcome attachment had approached to within three feet of a damaged section of wall, and called out in English. The hole made by the defenders had been the size of two bricks; the APCs cannon had widened it enough to crawl through, if one were feeling suicidal of course.

Nikoli was close behind the man, who had burdened him with the added responsibility of his presence.

“Hello in there, why don’t you come on out… without your weapons of course”?

After a few moments a voice had answered.

“Why aye… an’ why don’t yez jus’ fuckin’ come on in too, like… we out yer bondook of course, hinney?”

Colonel General Alontov turned to Nikoli with a frown on his face. “I do not have the faintest idea of what he said?”

Nikoli was frowning too.

“He’s a Geordie sir, from Tyneside in the north-east of England, the north side of the river Tyne where it runs through the city of Newcastle, to be exact… and his wife’s name is Janet.”

Alontov stared at the young lieutenant, he was not even aware that the man even spoke the language, now it seemed he was an expert in dialects… and possibly having a joke at his commanders expense.

“Company Sarn’t Major Probert… Colin, stop fucking about and come out. None of you will be harmed… it’s Lieutenant Bordenko.”

“Fanny M… well fuck me but it’s a small world!”

Colin had laid the accent on thick when the first voice had called on him to surrender. On hearing his friend’s voice he answered in his usual accent, which was much diluted by years in the army.

“Lieutenant… ?” Alontov queried his subordinate.

“I spent some time as an observer with the British Army, until the war started in fact sir. That man is a friend of mine… and a very good soldier, he may well decide to go down fighting.”

Alontov looked at his watch; the last two battalions from the city would be arriving very shortly. He had a battle to fight and this diversion would have to be curtailed.

“You have five minutes to persuade him to lead his men out, after that time I will destroy the building, lieutenant… ” but Nikoli had lain down his weapon and pushed past the general, dropping down and was squirming through the hole.

Colin had been trying to watch all possible entrances at once when smoke wafted in from the outside and he had pounding feet. To the best of his knowledge, the enemy had taken no prisoners at the river and if he was not shot out of hand he had no desire to be tortured. It had come as a shock to hear Nikoli calling him by name and the daylight was blocked out from one of the holes, but he held his fire. In the gloomy interior, the only illumination was that provided by the light streaming through holes made by enemy fire. He recognised Nikoli by his breathing as he pulled himself through the hole.

“Hold your fire!” Nikoli paused when he heard Colin shout; he could see little and did not want his good deed for the day to end with a bullet, blunt or sharp edged instrument

“If you’re the first to surrender Fanny, it’s going to get a wee bit crowded in here, mate.”

Nikoli peered into the interior, trying to locate the voice. It sounded as if it came from down low so he looked there, but there were only shadows, some darker than others were. He kept his hands in plain view and looked carefully around him, if he hadn’t known better he could have sworn that he was alone here.

“Lieutenant… are you all right?” queried Alontov’s voice from without.

“Well Colin… am I?”

A dark shape separated from a deep shadow and stood, the dull clink of belted ammunition reached Nikoli’s ears.

“You can tell him you are fine, mate, but I have no intention of surrendering my arms just so you can put a bullet in the back of my head or pull my teeth without anaesthetic.”

Nikoli was a little puzzled but called.

“I am in no danger, Colonel General sir.”

“Good,” came the general’s reply. “But you have only three minutes young lieutenant… So use them well.”

“Your people kill our troops after they surrender, or are captured… even the wounded!” He explained what had happened at the river, and what he knew of similar events in Belorussia.

Nikoli could see that Colin was apparently relaxed, yet the nozzle of the GPMG that hung from his shoulders by a webbing sling never wavered from where it was pointing, at his own midriff. Colin continued.

“I thought I knew you better than that Fanny, do you agree with it … or just look the other way?”

“I know nothing of this Colin… honestly. You have my word that our orders are to treat all prisoners according to the rules of the Geneva Convention… to the letter,” he added sincerely.

Despite their different ranks, the two men had been friends at Brecon and Colin weighed up the Russian officers words. If he stayed here he would die, but if he left with Nikoli, he would always have the possibility of escape.

“Ah bollocks!”

He turned sideways on to Nikoli and opened the gimpy’s top cover, allowing the belt of rounds to fall away and carried out a complete unload. Nikoli let out a breath of relief as he watched the dark outline of the British soldier remove the gimpy’s butt, slide out the working parts and throw them into the darkness.

They emerged from the hole into the daylight where Nikoli nodded to two of his paratroopers who stripped off the Guardsman’s webbing and searched him. While this was going on Nikoli approached the general.

“Sir, do you know of any orders to kill prisoners?” Alontov frowned as his lieutenant related the British soldiers’ words.

“I know this man well sir, he is too intelligent to be taken in by propaganda, if he says it happened then it probably did.”

The colonel general was a complex man, who on the one hand had approved the destruction of entire cities if it restored his Motherland, the Rodina, to its rightful place, yet on the other hand the murder of fighting men who served their own countries bravely, disgusted him. As a professional, he knew that his enemies would fight all the harder if they believed they had nothing to lose. When it had been confirmed that only the Washington bomb had gone off, he had felt secretly relieved, although it only meant they would have a tougher fight on their hands.

During the planning of this war, the question of prisoners had naturally been planned for. Enemy troops were to be placed into internment camps until all resistance to the new Soviet Union had been overcome. The anticipated, massive destruction would require a workforce to rebuild the cities and infrastructure. Who better to serve as the core of that workforce than the captured troops?

“Blindfold him and bind him properly lieutenant, take him to the brigade headquarters here at the airport. I want to question him later but in the meantime you and your men are to guard him, understood?”

The US Embassy in Grosvenor Square is one of the few buildings in the British Isles to call its ‘ground floor’ the ‘first floor’. It is one of the little details that separates the British from the Americans, along with driving on the wrong side of the road and having not having roundabouts at road junctions.

Security for visitors is not oppressive once you enter the door; that begins once you try to go up, to the floors above. Scott Tafler and Max Reynolds were ensconced in the ‘clean room’ upstairs. Its construction and constant screening made it secure from all known forms of eavesdropping.

“No one is happy with our borrowing an entire squadron of F-117As, and a half dozen B-2s, even if it is only for one night for most of them. Those stealth fighters of the Ruski’s took us all by surprise, and NATO wants the Nighthawks over Germany to counter them.” Scott informed the head of the London station.

“The air force will do as its told, the joint chiefs have given the plan their full backing, plus there will be six Raptors arriving from stateside this lunchtime.” Scott was intrigued.

“Six Raptors, is that all they have?” The project had cost billions and was years behind schedule.

“Congress has a hard-on for one size fits all, one aircraft for all the services, that’s why the Tomcat’s the navy has are irreplaceable, all the tooling to build more was destroyed.”

Scott was appalled.

“How the hell are they going to replace the losses we’ve had… and which asshole ordered the tooling destroyed?”

“I am not at liberty to say… however, the SecDef was what the Brits would call ‘A right wanker’.” Scott grimaced at the appalling Hollywood cockney accent.

“At present there are only one hundred and twenty one Tomcats still in existence, I understand that there are some A-6 Intruders out at the bone yard that are being refurbished, made ready to replace the strike assets that have gone. As to the question of congressional stupidity… try writing to your congressman.”

“Wasn’t there a retired Admiral who proposed buying the production licences for Russian airframes and putting US engines in them, at a fraction of the cost?” Scott asked.

“There was, but the big US military manufacturing community, had too many people on The Hill tucked in their pockets for that to ever be realistic… I guess we are paying the price for electing some people who make straight for the trough. They have delivered on one aspect though; we are getting more anti-satellite missiles.”

Scott nodded and got back to the matter at hand.

“The buddy stores capability of the Spirits has helped a hell of a lot with the tanking aspect of the mission, according to the air force planners.”

“What about our crew and the weapon?” Max emphasised the last word.

“It arrives tomorrow, system checks have been completed and it’s good to go. So is the pilot and bombardier, the air force ran psychological tests on them both, they’ll push the button when the time comes. At the moment they are putting in simulator time before strapping in and scaring the sheep in the Highlands.”

“On the subject of nuking a piece of Russia, how are Major Bedonavich and Miss Vorsoff taking it?” Max asked him.

“Neither was naïve enough to believe that we would, or could put troops on the ground to capture or kill the leadership. I didn’t even try to pretend that we would even consider it as an option. Major Bedonavich has actually been in one of the bunkers, and that was a help in itself because it was the first that we knew, that particular one existed.” Scott rubbed his chin.

“He is not ecstatic about using a bomb on a bunker, in his country or anywhere else on the planet for that matter, but he believes it is the only way.”

“It has got to be hard on the man, it’s not a position I would like to be in if I were called on to facilitate the dropping of one on America… how about the girl?”

“I don’t think we have a problem with either of them, on that count.”

Max Reynolds forehead creased a fraction, he was a ‘people reader’, trained to read body language and pick up on minute clues as to what may be going on in another person’s head.

“What?” was all he asked Scott now.

Tafler took out two folders, one slightly fatter than the other. He handed over the larger one first.

“Debrief section, last page, and the third paragraph down.”

Max turned to the page in question and looked up at Scott when he finished reading.

“Does Major Bedonavich know about this?”

“If he does he hasn’t said… and I did not see that any purpose could be served in broaching the subject to him.” He then handed over the second folder, which bore the FBIs logo and the subject’s name. “Findings section, second page.”

Max started to read and raised his eyebrows soon after, before double checking the name on the front of the folder and reading it again.

Forests cover almost twenty-eight percent of Poland, much of it untouched by forestry management, and although it did not make for classic tank country it did provide good natural cover for a defender. Four miles from the Oder River in the 1940’s, the German Wermacht had built a bunker complex within the primeval forest, and the Soviet Red Army had improved and expanded it in the 1960’s. Today it appeared to be as abandoned and neglected as it had been since the Soviets had quit. The chain link fence surrounding it was rusted and hanging away from supporting posts in quite a few places, and the minefield had been cleared years before. Birds and animals from the forest had taken up residence in the reinforced concrete guard posts and there was nothing to suggest that it was the nerve centre for the defence of Poland against her old Russian occupier and allies.

Joseph Ludowej accompanied his minister on the seven-mile journey along the tunnel of a worked out coalmine before reaching a much newer, vertical shaft. A lift had taken them up to the command centre, sixty feet below the surface where his president, cabinet and High Command of all the polish armed forces was gathered with their staffs and the NATO liaison team. The minister was as tired and fraught as his personal secretary was, so he had not noticed how withdrawn the man had been over the last few days. Joseph’s work had not been lacking; there was nothing there to indicate that he was under any greater stress than was to be expected, given the current circumstances. The polish army and air force were planning to drive across the border into Belorussia and into the flank of the Red Army Group that had finished reconstituting after the kick in the teeth it had received earlier. Joseph knew that much, but not the details.

The minister left him in an anteroom with various other functionaries before passing through to the war room and Joseph looked about him, nodding to acquaintances as he counted heads. He had deliberately mislaid the ministers briefcase before they had left on the journey to reach this place, delaying them for almost thirty minutes to ensure they would be last to arrive. Everyone else was here, the heads of all the armed forces and the cabinet, so Joseph began his play acting, swearing softly under his breath as he hurriedly opened his own briefcase and reached inside it. There was little room for documents inside the case, but he opened it in such a way as to conceal the true contents and depressed a switch before removing a folder and closing the case once more. He held the folder high and rushed toward the war rooms’ door as if he had an important document he had forgotten to give to the minister. The armed sentry on the door knew Joseph by sight and name, the Defence Ministers personal secretary always had a smile and a cheery greeting for everyone, unlike some of them who were too full of their own self-importance to so much as say good morning. Joseph was relieved that the sentry did not argue or hinder him but held the door wide, permitting him to enter. No one inside the war room noticed his entrance except an air force colonel when Joseph jostled him. The colonel was about to ask him his business but noticed Joseph was muttering to himself, it sounded like

“Forgive me Karena,” repeated over and over. Exactly four minutes after the switch had been depressed, a bomb containing four pounds of Semtex H in Joseph’s briefcase exploded.

It had been the government and strong leadership of the armed forces, that had been the principle reason for the failure of the coup days before, and both of those elements had now been removed, permanently.

Alontov was not in the best of tempers when he appeared at the brigade headquarters. NATOs fighter bombers and their artillery’s counter-battery missions had prevented him from doing more than re-securing the perimeter and forcing the enemy back a couple of hundred yards. The effort had cost him four of his precious light tanks and five APCs, along with almost a hundred and sixty casualties.

The enemy was fighting furiously and resisted his counter attack like men possessed. The prisoners they had taken were convinced they were going to be tortured and killed. Three in fact had been shot, when they killed one of the soldiers guarding them and tried to make a break for it. The Geneva Convention forbids prisoners from killing or injuring their captors, but as these men obviously believed his men wouldn’t play by the rules then why should they? The matter of the wounded was also a concern to him, two full field hospitals were supposed to have been delivered towards the end of the airlift in, but they hadn’t arrived. All he had were combat medics and two surgeons per battalion, and the equipment they carried was minimal. He could, and was using the hospitals in the city, but NATO had yet to unleash its full force, when that happened he would have civilians too, swamping those facilities. He caught the eye of the major commanding the signal's detachment.

“Get me the NATO commander on the radio; I want to discuss a cease fire whilst prisoners are exchanged.”

The major hesitated.

“Sir is that wise?”

Alontov looked at the man questioningly.

“Sir, our own signals intelligence… outside of this division, will be certain to intercept it… what I mean to say sir, is that your motives might be misconstrued by the High Command?”

Alontov gave him a cynical smile.

“The seat polishers will have to come here if they want to arrest me, I do not think I have very much to worry about on that score, so… do as I ask.” The signals major nodded and began to turn away. “But thank you for your concern anyway Major,” Alontov added.

Elena Ludwej had knelt with her arms around her three sobbing daughters as the van that they had been bundled out of now disappeared around a bend on the forest track. She had no idea where they were, a woman wearing a ski mask had merely pointed down the track and stated.

“Go that way.” It was in the opposite direction to which the van had left in, and so she soothed her girls as best she could before picking up little Lulu and they had set off.

It was a warm spring afternoon and she had told stories to the children as they walked, it helped her put aside, temporarily, their ordeal at the hands of the masked men and women who had appeared in their home with guns and knives.

She never knew what it was that they wanted of them; they had been taken by the same van on a long journey, although how long not something she could tell as her watch was broken. She had been allowed to say just a few words to her husband by telephone on two occasions, the rest of the time they had been kept in a locked room without windows. Their captors had spoken rarely, but when they had their accents sounded like they came from the north of Poland. Her thoughts on being set free were to contact her husband and the police, who must surely have been searching for them and their kidnappers.

After two hours’ of walking, the children were tired and hungry. The track they were walking on was now running along the side of a hill and the trees thinned out on the downslope side. The bottom of the hill was only about a hundred yards away where there was a tarmac road. In the field on the far side of the road Karena saw a tank and the polish soldiers, who were the crew, sat on the vehicle’s turret, so she waved and called out. Apart from glancing in her direction the soldiers ignored her and Karena stopped her antics. This was very odd, she thought the soldiers looked rather dejected and there was something odd about the tank, which she could not quite place. If nothing else they could give her directions to the nearest village or town, or perhaps even use their radio to call the police, so she started down the hill. Her arms were aching from carrying Lulu; the two-year-old was growing so fast these days. At the bottom of the hill she heard the sound of heavy engines, their reverberating noise began to fill the air and she called the other two girls to her. Looking along the road in the direction of the sound of approaching vehicles, she saw it disappeared into a dark woodland tunnel where ancient trees spread their branches wide. Early leaves were bright green and they conspired to block out the sunlight that fell upon the road, and Karena felt a shiver of dread run up her spine. Three armoured, eight-wheeled reconnaissance vehicles shot out of the darkness and into the sunlight. Travelling at about fifty miles an hour they tore past, their passage ruffled the hair and clothing of the woman and her three children before disappearing around a curve. She looked across the road at the soldiers, who had watched the vehicles with disgusted expressions. The rattle of tank tracks emerged from the sound of heavy engines, drawing all eyes back toward the tunnel-like spot. Like the reconnaissance vehicles, the tanks when they emerged were travelling at speed and Karena pulled her daughters with her as she stepped back a few paces.

As the first of many main battle tanks thundered past, Karena looked opened mouthed from the small flag on its antennae and back to the tank in the field. The soldiers were making no effort to prevent the tanks flying hammer and sickle flags from driving into their country, and the polish tanks main gun remained pointing backwards across the engine deck, away from the road.

Forty-six aircraft crossed the frontier enroute for Leipzig, a further sixteen orbited over Czech territory, these last aircraft were the Il-76 tankers and an A-50 AWAC, within the protection provided by AAA and with friendly air riding shotgun.

Ten Su-37 Golden Eagles led the way, and as before they were looking to remove ground radar and AWACs to ensure safe passage for their charges, Il-76s heavily laden with ammunition pallet’s, mostly for the artillery.

For their debut, they had had the benefit of surprise and the use of the enemy’s radar data hacked and downloaded by Red Army intelligence. Tonight they had only their wits and radar absorbent skins to help them, because NATO was not going to be suckered again as it had during the battle for the Wesernitz.

The previous night, NATO had their AWACs aloft but they had bolted to the rear well before the Russian stealth fighters had come within firing range. Everywhere, radars switched off and stayed off, it was as if NATO could see them coming but did not engage them. What NATO had engaged though, were the transport aircraft and the Red air force could only theorise on the cause.

Between the line of German brigades and besieged Leipzig, NATO had a crescent of AAA systems that had IR tracking and acquisition capabilities.

Unlike radar, there is little to alert an enemy to IR scanning except the systems small super-cooled sensors.

Radars day as the all-powerful secret weapon became numbered not long after its birth, when someone realised that with the right equipment the source could be pin-pointed. Admittedly its death is a long time coming but come it surely shall, and the nail that seals the coffin will be some other form of long range surveillance technology, as good as if not superior to the cathode ray tube. The smart money is already on how long before the successors Achilles heel is found though.

Infrared sensoring on Jernas equipped Rapiers, thermal cameras on Crotale NGs, Piranha wheeled AA vehicles thermal sights for their Mistral missiles, Roland’s Glaive sight systems and the Stormers IR sensors formed a barrier that nothing warmer than its surroundings could cross undetected.

The vehicles were in groups, and at least one would track the hi-tech Russian fighters for as long as possible once they had passed overhead.

Four pairs of F-117A stealth fighters were aloft and waiting for the advanced Russian fighters and they received their initial intercept data from the AAA units on the ground.

The first flight of four Il-76 transports were not to know it, but they were the bait that would locate the NATO AAA units that were so hindering the resupply of the airborne troops holding Leipzig.

72 Battery, Royal Artillery had divided into teams of three launchers each and were covering their sector, seven miles in length to the southwest of Leipzig. Elderly FV-432 APCs were the tractors that towed the Rapier FSCs. Field Standard C, systems to the firing points and the eight Mk2 Rapier missiles attached to the rotary towers.

Gunner Sally Whinley and L/Cpl Peter Gaurt unhooked the missile trailer before moving away the APC. The Dagger and Blindfire radars remained off whilst the passive infrared electro-optic sensor, mounted on the top of the turret was activated. The tracking device was soon in use providing passive target detection and acquisition in the Rapiers radar-silent mode. At the weapon control terminal the operator ran through his checklist and once satisfied that all was performing as required, the signal was sent that they were ready for business. Gaurt and Whinley got busy with pick and shovel and soon had dug a deep shell scrape, which they occupied, watching for enemy troops roaming behind the lines.

It was three hours’ before any airborne sources were detected and when they were the data was swiftly analysed. The pair of Su-37s they had detected was tracked as they passed them by and the data was passed on down the line.

In their hasty defensive positions Peter and Sally remained silent as they listened for hostile movement. Being so close was difficult for them as they were in the very physical discover phase of a relationship that had begun just a fortnight before, when Sally had joined the unit after a swiftly curtailed basic training course. It is hard to keep a romance secret in the closed environment of a mixed fighting unit and the other members of the unit had cottoned on quickly. Sally was a very pretty eighteen year old girl from Hertfordshire with an almost fragile quality about her and a lot of the ribbing Peter got from his mates was envy based. The battery sergeant major was not overjoyed when Gunner Whinley had joined the unit because she had no to-arms skills to offer the under strength unit. It wasn’t her fault that the war had broken out before she could complete her basic training and skills-to-arms course, so she was just an extra pair of hands and a warm body on the stag (sentry) roster. Peter was the 432s driver, and as such had no other skills other than the not too difficult task of attaching reloads, a skill quickly mastered by Sally. The unit had been stood down for essential maintenance the previous day and L/Cpl Gaurt had taken the Gunner Whinley with him in the 432 to a nearby village, ostensibly to forage for fresh produce. The healthy young couple’s relationship had taken the next step up in a small copse far from prying eyes, with a frantic half-hour’ copulating amongst the conifers. And so it was that they now concentrated hard on their tasks as sentries, in order to ignore each other’s presence.

An hour after the stealth fighters had past, the first lumbering Il-76 transports were detected at 8,000’, an altitude that was far higher than was safe but one that they had been ordered to fly at.

One of the transports was within their engagement area and a single Rapier 2 leapt into the air. The Rapier FSC system has the ability to process seventy five threats per second and sort out friend from foe whilst it is doing so, but for that it needed its frequency agile 3D pulse Doppler, J-band radar. There were not supposed to be any NATO aircraft in their engagement area so the missile was loosed anyway, without the need to go active on radar and inspect its credentials.

It took twenty seconds for the Soviet operators to pinpoint the firing point by radar backtracking, another thirty seconds to send the co-ordinates to the gun lines and three minutes for the first shells to leave the barrels. The time of flight for the shells was a further one minute seven seconds.

The launching of the Rapier was the signal for the sentries to return on the double because they were in danger of receiving unwanted attention, should the launch have been detected.

Peter reversed the APC up to their Rapier trailer and leapt out to assist the rest of the crew attach it. Adrenaline was coursing through all their veins in the knowledge that enemy artillery or ground attack aircraft could at that moment be heading towards them.

The trailer was hooked up and the crew dispersed at a run to their various vehicles. As Peter put the 432 into gear a flush faced young female Gunner closed the rear hatch behind her and let out a nervous giggle, relieved that they were now moving and out of danger.

Sixteen 240mm shells arrived on the battery’s position before it had reached safety, one landed squarely atop Peter and Sally’s APC, tearing through the thin top armour before exploding. It had taken the Gunners just too long to hook up and move on to their next firing positions.

When the shells arrived at the firing points before Leipzig, most of the AAA units were already in the process of relocating to new sites and one other was destroyed, also a were towed Rapier unit, it took longer for them to relocate. The Crotales, Pirhanas, Stormers and Roland’s were all self-propelled, so for them it was a case of shoot ‘n scoot, but three suffered damage from artillery fire that put them out of action for the night.

A somewhat ragged gap had been created for the ammunition airlift to enter, although eight more of the big transports were shot down whilst entering or egressing that night.

The Nighthawks had the advantage over the Russian stealth fighters inasmuch as they had a last bearing, course and speed to work from in hunting them, other than that it was back to the dark ages as far as night fighting went. The billion dollar aircraft were reduced to groping about in the dark for their enemy, much as their wire and canvas skinned, biplane predecessors had when looking for Zeppelin’s over London and the Home Counties, almost a hundred years before.

Two Su-37s left fiery trails down from the heavens to the hard unforgiving earth but so also did a Nighthawk.

Uncharacteristically, an almost flat calm greeted the periscope of the Royal Navy Trafalgar class SSN, HMS Hood. The thin ESM mast with its radar absorbent skin had preceded the way to the surface to sample the electronic traffic, both radio and radar. Radioactivity had been monitored since even before they had turned about, they were at war and it was looked for as a matter of routine. The seawater was tested as they progressed along and the air above was also sampled whenever the ESM mast poked up above the waves, a RAD counter monitored the different rays and their levels whilst another device tasted the breeze for toxicity as it tested for Chemical and Germ warfare agents.

The vastness of the Pacific was diluting the highly irradiated water at ground zero. There were dead fish aplenty, many were from species that lived far below the surface where light never reached, siphoned to the surface by the thermal effects caused by superheated surface water.

There were no human bodies, nor any wreckage or flotsam from the carrier group in the area, all of that would now be dust and vapour. The ESM mast could detect no distress beacons from life rafts either, so once the periscope disappeared below the surface the ESM followed it.

The predominant currents and wind had been calculated to give them an idea of where any life rafts might now be, had any aircraft been outside the danger area when the Russian nuclear weapons had destroyed the USS Kitty Hawk and her escorts. The Hood altered course and her captain gave orders to go deep, they would approach the surface again in two hours’.

Nikki had regained consciousness during the morning but was extremely weak. They had no method of feeding her nutrition or fluids intravenously whilst she had been unconscious, and now that she was awake they had limited water and food with which to help restore her reserves. She was propped up against the inflated wall of the raft, which improved the cramped conditions slightly. The seawater still was only designed to supply water for one person, but here they were with three of them now fully reliant upon it. The half-litre bottles of fresh water in their survival vests had long since been drunk. The best they could hope for was that it would rain and they could use the canvas sea anchor to collect the rainwater and fill their small bottles from that.

The fishing line was trailing in the sea and Sandy had it tied around his little finger, in order to feel any nibbles. With the slight increase in room, Chubby had used a marker pen to draw the squares on the ‘deck’ that they now used as a chessboard. The chess ‘pieces’ were squares of paper from Sandy’s notebook.

Chubby’s Knight was about to take Sandy’s last Bishop and put him in check when something collided with their raft.

“Anyone alive in there?” a Lancashire voice hailed.

Chubby was nearest the entrance to the raft and leant out to see an elderly man with sun weathered skin kneeling on the deck of a Ketch, he held the lifeboats painter in his hand, still wet from the ocean it had been fished out of with a boat hook.

“Yes… ” Chubby was startled.

“There are three of us.”

He hadn’t noticed anyone else until a voice called out to the man on the deck.

“Who is it Eric?” The speaker was a tiny elderly lady who had the same accent as the man.

“It’s a bloody foreigner, that’s who!” grizzled the weather beaten sailor.

“Mind your language and help him on board!”

Muttering under his breath he secured the painter to a cleat and extended his hand to the American, helping him onto the deck. It took two attempts to assist the weakened Nikki aboard and the elderly lady left the wheel to hurry forward, where she fussed over her and hustled her below. Sandy brought with him their meagre supplies and the seawater still before the raft was cast adrift.

“I suppose you’re a bloody yank an ‘all?” was his greeting from the sailor.

“No I’m not, I’m Scottish.” He replied with a friendly smile, but if he thought his rescuer would be pleased he was mistaken.

“Another bloody foreigner, the best thing about Scotland is the road out of it… do any of you speak Chinese, there’s one of them lot on board too?”

On April 27^th 1521, at a place now called Puerto (or Punta) Engaño in a wide bay on the north of the low lying island of Mactan, Fernao de Magalhaes or to give him his Spanish name, Ferdinand Magellan, the great Portuguese explorer in the pay of the Spanish crown, had attempted to land and take the island by conquest. The local chieftain, a warrior by the name of Rajah (Chief) Lapu-Lapu had been kept abreast of Magellan’s activities by spies and messengers; he had no intention of being delivered unto Christianity and a Catholic God by way of a sharp edge across the back of the neck.

Apart from gunpowder, the other piece of high technology of the day that gave the invaders military superiority was armour plate, helmets, back and breastplates that protected vital organs. Lapu-Lapu and his men had only native Kampilan’s, Kalis and Daga’s, spears, broadswords, daggers and loin cloths along with their skill in the art of Kali and the Kun Tao way, a form of martial art. However, Lapu-Lapu may have been a primitive heathen in the eyes of the European invaders, but he had a warrior’s eye for tactics and a keen mind.

The spot that the boats from the Trinidad, Concepción, and Victoria headed for is no longer a sandy shore, Mangrove has long since choked off easy access from the sea, but it was here that Lapu-Lapu and his men lay in wait for the Spanish and their Portuguese leader.

When the Europeans jumped from their ships boats into water it came up to their chests in some cases. Both protected and hampered by helmets, arm and torso armour they had left off the plate that protected ham strings, knees and thighs because full armour and deep water are a bad combination for the wearer. Lapu-Lapu and his men attacked, unburdened by the heavy steel plate that weighed down their enemy wading ashore. Lapu-Lapu himself is said to have slain Magellan by stabbing him in both inner thighs before he could reach dry land and the first wave of invaders were routed, with the remainder forced to retire.

481 years later, on the afternoon of April 4th the invaders were Chinese and they also chose to land in the same bay, now named the Bay of Magellan. By landing there they had but a short haul to the joint civil and military airbase. Not much further away to the southwest lay the two road bridges spanning the Opon Channel, beyond that channel lay the larger island known as ‘The Princess of the South’, Cebu.

The only usable strip on Cebu for aircraft had been built by the Philippine Army Air Corps in 1941 at Lahug Field, Cebu City. It was overrun by heavily armed Japanese marines who’d been landed by seaplane in 1941, retaken by the Americans in 1945 before falling once more to Japanese in business suits in the mid-1990’s, who promptly built a shopping Mall and business park on the land. It may not have been conquest in accordance with the Bushido code, but it did far better on the stock markets.

A successful military occupation of Cebu as a base of operations required the use of all-weather tarmac runways, and Mactan had the only one.

With the Philippines Navy fully engaged off the islands of Luzon to the north and Palawan to the west in harassing other Chinese landings, it fell to the army to defend Cebu and Mactan.

The PRC had no paratroops available to seize the airport and so it had been left unmolested by their navy and air force as they needed it undamaged and operational almost immediately upon capture.

Colonel Lucio Villiarin was the commander of Philippine forces on Cebu and Mactan, an infantryman by trade and the son of a fisherman; he had spent almost his entire career fighting Muslim extremists on the southern islands. He knew he couldn’t keep the enemy from landing, he strongly doubted he could prevent the airfield from falling into their hands, but he was going to bleed them every yard of the way before withdrawing into the hills to fight on guerrilla style.

Once he had been informed that Chinese forces were heading for the Philippines he had set to work utilising whatever lay at hand, local shipping, and the construction teams at the airport who were expanding the airport facilities and buildings, and Cebu’s quarries and bottling plants.

Colonel Villiarin had few forces on Mactan; the barracks next to the airport at Benito Ebuen Air Base was empty and rigged for demolition. What he did have, aside from airbase defence troops, were OPs covering the shoreline all along the coast.

The colonel had read the situation well and had done his combat appreciation. The southeast shoreline was the territory of the tourist resorts with their palm trees and white sand beaches, all of it was suitable for a seaborne invasion, but the not-so pristine beaches to the north were equally ideal and far closer to the bridges and the airport.

All the airbases C-130 Hercules had left the previous day to move troops and supplies on Luzon, as had the smaller Caribou transports and helicopters. They had huge quantities of aviation fuel at the airport for the military aircraft and civil airliners, but the field was now bare of aircraft with the exception of a China Sea-Pacific Airlines A318-100 Airbus, grounded by an electrical fault.

A fleet of vehicles had carried barrels of aviation fuel to Cebu harbour where they had been loaded along with barrels of diesel fuel aboard the numerous rotting and rusting hulks that inhabit any port in the world. From there the hulks had been towed to designated sites and their sea cocks opened, once demolition engineers had finished preparing them.

Captain Timothy Yukomata of CSP Airlines had slept aboard the aircraft for the past two nights whilst he awaited the arrival of a technician to fix the fault on the aircraft. No technician had arrived and the manager of the airline office in Cebu had left the decision with him, whether or not to fly the aircraft to safety in Australia. He killed the time by listening into the local military radio traffic and watching the army engineers and civilian construction workers. As a hole was dug an angle grinder cut a shallow groove from it to the buildings and after half an hours’ activity in the hole, it and the grooves were sealed with poured concrete and then smoothed over.

He had been on the Sydney to Manila run although the aircraft had few passengers on the trip, mainly Filipinos anxious to return to their families or eager to fight. The airline was part owned by the Philippines government so it was not much of a surprise to Timothy that he was also carrying items described as ‘machine parts’ as freight. It was hardly an original ploy but they obviously sought to get as much ordinance to the island as they could, by any and all means before air traffic their ceased. Carry munitions and passengers was definitely a no-no under civil aviation rules, but he would bet good money that for the past few days every inch of space on all aircraft landing in the Philippines had been packed with similarly described cargo. When ATC had broadcast the news that Okinawa was being invaded and Luzon was under air attack, they had been only a half-hour from Manila, therefore in danger of being attacked. He had turned the aircraft around with the intention of landing his passengers at Davao on the second largest island in the Philippines, Mindanao. The engine fire warning light had prompted an emergency landing at the nearer Mactan International, even though it was patently obvious on the flight deck that the port engine was fine. Regulations stated that the aircraft could not be flown until the fault was rectified but there were no Airbus qualified maintenance crews at Mactan and they were ordered to wait for them to arrive from Australia. However, no civilian airliners landed at Mactan as it was now within the war zone and the passengers left the island by ship, along with the rest of the crew the next day. Timothy had contacted the local military command centre, desperate for news of Okinawa and he had gone bearing gifts, the freight that had been intended for Manila. In return for the ‘machine parts’, which incidentally turned out to be of the shoulder fired, armour-piercing variety, they had shown him US satellite photos. It took him a minute to realise that what he was looking at was not an old aerial photo of the Somme battlefield. Rocket artillery and fuel air munitions had obliterated his village from the map along with the neighbouring town of Naha, where their parents lived. He knew in his heart that his family had been home when the Chinese attack had begun, so he chose to remain with the aircraft and the solitude that the duty brought, left alone with his thoughts.

The PLAN landings were supposed to have taken place before dawn, but a problem had arisen with the engines of the older of the two amphibious assault vessels taking part. The shallow draft Yukan class landing ship had gotten underway again, taking station behind the smaller but deeper drafted Yuting class Xux. It was late morning before the assault ships and their escort of two frigates, a destroyer and three fast attack boats were sighted by a fishing boat, one of many acting as early warning pickets lying out of sight of the islands.

Aboard the fishing boat, the skipper checked his charts and GPS before sending a clear and precise sighting report by radio. Colonel Villiarin was in his command post on a hillside above Cebu City when the fisherman’s report was received. The skipper was a retired bosuns mate with twenty years’ service in the Philippines Navy behind him. Villiarin listened admiringly as the number of ships and types, position, course and speed of the invaders was sent over and over. After a minutes worth of transmission, gunfire could be heard in the background but the skippers voice remained calm and clear until the first hits by a rapid firing cannon began to rake his vessel. There was silence in the CP as all present stared at the speaker on the man-portable RT set, the fishing boat skipper merely raised his voice to be heard above the noise of exploding 30mm cannon shells as he carried on reporting until suddenly the transmission ended in mid-sentence.

The three OPs covering the Bay of Magellan had been dug by JCBs operated by the airport’s construction crews. Timber, concrete slabs and sandbags protected them from the coming storm, after which sand and earth had been smoothed over, camouflaging them from prying eyes. The soldiers’ manning the OPs stared out across the open waters of the bay where only fishermen’s buoys bobbed on the waves. The enemy ships were still below the horizon when the roar of aircraft engines broke the quiet of the bay and the large shadow of an airliner were cast upon the sea, heading northeast.

The lookouts aboard the PLAN amphibious assault ship Xux were alert and scanning the horizon for periscopes, ships and aircraft. Emcon was in force

Despite the loss of nights covering shroud, and although they knew the location of all Philippine Navy vessels, a satellite pass had caught several Singaporean surface combat units transiting the Sulu Sea, presumably enroute to Australia. At this moment those vessels could be anywhere within a 100-mile radius of their last known position and contact with them could wreck the planned landings.

Rock from the islands quarries had been loaded into the Cebu fishing boats hold and its mast removed, creating low visual and radar profiles. Hastily applied blue paint added to the reason that the small vessel went undetected by the lookouts. Once her radio had begun transmitting however, the PLAN had her position locked down to within six feet.

The fast attack boats had closed rapidly on the tiny unarmed vessel which they had sunk within three minutes of opening fire, but not before her skipper had reported troop carrying helicopters onboard the larger vessels spooling up and crewmen aboard the assault ships, hastily operating the ships large derricks, swinging outboard the hovercraft that occupied their fore decks.

The PLAN task force carried two battalions of marines, two light tanks, two BMP-80s and the means to deliver them ashore by helicopter, hovercraft and LC (T), landing craft (tank). As the defenders probably knew where they now were, they lost no time in putting the first stage of the assault into operation. Two Hokum attack helicopters raced towards the horizon whilst six troop carriers followed on, destination Mactan International airport.

A hundred marines were packed aboard the Ming Tz assault hovercraft, the noise of the turbofan engines reverberated across the water but inside their armoured hulls the troops had only been aware of the crush of their neighbours as they held themselves upright by gripping the rails welded to the cabin roof in the troop compartment. There had been no room to sit and no seating even if there had been for the men were packed in like sardines. Four of the five rotating gun turrets housed twin mounted 7.62mm machine guns, set at each corner of the rectangular hulls. A 23mm cannon occupied the fifth, set slightly forward of the centreline, above the cockpit.

Heading southwest at forty-nine knots the gunners had scant moments to register the civilian airliner that passed 50’ above their heads, heading northeast at three hundred and eighty knots.

Timothy Yukomata had at least been able to silence the audible engine fire warning, but he had to remind himself that he had not long to endure the constant chatter from Nagging Nellie, scolding him in a digitally created voice that he was too low.

A quick warning was broadcast to the task force from one of the three fast attack boats that preceded the hovercraft, but the Airbus had arrived before completion of the message, ploughing into the Xux at full throttle.

The Hokum’s had arrived over the airport with little or no warning and made short work of dispatching the pair of .5 calibre machine guns in a sandbagged emplacement atop the arrivals terminal. Six other bunkers about the airfield were chewed up by their cannon, but they saw no troops on the ground. To all intents and purposes the facility bore every sign of having been abandoned in haste. The runway-widening project the helicopter crews had been told of appeared to have reached the point where the hardcore in the foundations awaited its first covering of concrete. The extension to the existing departures lounge was at the concrete and cinder block shell stage but no construction workers or airport personnel were to be seen.

The troop carriers followed the plan for an unopposed landing; the major in command of this phase had sneered in contempt that the Filipinos had not even attempted to block the runway before running away.

Three of his helicopters dropped off marines about the perimeter and once done the major ordered his own and the two remaining helicopters to land on the hard standing before the arrivals and departures buildings. Intent as he had been on looking for enemy points of resistance he had not noticed the colour and texture of concrete was not uniform. As he sprinted across the concrete towards the airport buildings he had in fact noticed, then dismissed, that the marine in front of him had left depressions in a five foot square patch of concrete that had not quite dried, as he ran across it.

The troop carriers had begun to lift off again to add the firepower of their door guns to that of the Hokum gunships when a Filipino combat engineer turned a handle that completed the firing circuit.

Far away in his hillside CP, Colonel Villiarin had watched with satisfaction through a telescope as heavy demolition charges destroyed the hard standing, buildings, tower, barracks, fuel dump and finally the runway where they had tunnelled at an angle below its foundations to place them. He had been too far away to distinguish individuals but the specks of four helicopters, one of them a gunship, had been swallowed by the fountaining concrete, rock and tarmac.

The Filipino troops in their OPs heard the hovercraft before they came into view, they were built for speed rather than stealth and the powerful engine plants, which pushed their bulks over the waves, could not be muted without losing efficiency. Even whilst the debris was still falling to earth, the airbase defence company had emerged from their camouflaged holes and waded into the surviving Chinese marines.

The first enemy vessels that hove into view were the fast attack boats, like greyhounds in line astern they’d entered the bay, pouring cannon and machine gun fire into likely cover, venturing to within 80’ of the shore as they did so.

Aside from reporting by landline the OPs took no further action, they had only one other task to perform before un-assing and bugging out.

Crewmen aboard the three fast craft saw the sea heave up to seaward of them and reported to the task force that the enemy had heavy artillery.

The troops in the OPs had been briefed that they needed to have line of sight to the fishermen’s buoys with their attached short range HF receivers, but with the fast attack boats churned up the waters, it had set the buoys bobbing wildly so it took over a minute of frantic button pressing before all the charges in the sunken hulks went off, rupturing barrels of Avgas and diesel, releasing their lighter than water contents. They had waited for the hovercraft to enter the bay before depressing a second switch, which detonated the incendiary bombs, affixed to the buoys radio receivers.

Hovercraft are lifted by cushions of air retained within the vessels skirts, which are usually made of rubber or similar, plastic based derivatives. The engines that produce the air cushion also provide propulsion, drawing in air in the case of the Chinese craft, through air scoops set in the hull.

To the pilots of the two craft when they eventually approached, the unobstructed view of the beach was replaced by flame and black oily smoke. Although they had already throttled back to 30 knots, they had plunged into the holocaust before they could sheer off. One pilot had slammed the throttles forward and held his course whilst the other threw the controls to the left, seeking to escape back out to sea. Neither action had saved the craft because starved of air and with the air scoops filters clogging with soot, their engines had at first laboured and then stalled.

Back aboard the big ships, the marines aboard the stricken Xux that were already aboard LC (T)s were stranded below decks. For their craft to be launched, buoyancy tanks in the ship’s hull have to be vented of air, allowing the mothership to settle in the water whereupon stern doors open, flooding the internal dock and the LC (T)s float out. Far from that happening, the Xux was down by the bow and engulfed in flame from the waterline to the top of her mangled superstructure. The bow down attitude raised the stern higher in the water but even had the LC (T)s been able to launch the sea all around the Xux was aflame. Timothy Yukomata’s Airbuses fuel tanks had been filled to capacity.

The remaining ships had continued on their way, abandoning the Xux and all aboard her to their fate as command of the operation passed to the second in command on the older Tinxu. In that ships command centre, reports had been coming in that had painted a bleak picture. Three marines from the heliborne assault were putting into practice their E&E, escape and evasion skills and did not known if any other of the troops on the ground had made it. The runway had been heavily cratered and so reinforcement by fixed wing aircraft was out of the question. The three fast attack craft had been forced to beach in order for the crews to escape the spreading sea of flames by wading ashore; they reported both of the hovercraft had been destroyed with all hands.

A Hokum and three troop carriers had been returning empty and when they were ordered to do a 180 and recover the three marines and stranded seamen they had switched off their radios, the crews being thoroughly rattled by events.

A wise man will never say

“It cannot get any worse than this!” because sod’s law dictates that as soon as the words have left his mouth, it bloody well does.

The new PLAN commander hadn’t said or even though the words but his day had gotten worse within minutes anyway.

In the channel between Cebu and its eastern neighbour Bohol, eleven missile and four anti-submarine patrol craft of the Singapore armed forces escorted eight minesweepers, assault ships and amphibious transport docks. With the political leanings of their neighbours uncertain, they had feared internment if they requested refuelling from them and so were enroute to Cebu to beg fuel for their voyage to Australia. As payment for this service they had intended offering the services of two of Singapore’s Rikon class coastal patrol submarines and crews, which at that time were playing rear guard. An AEW Sea King from one of their Fearless class assault ships had intercepted the PLAN Task Forces transmissions and seen the rising palls of smoke.

For the task force commander to have turned back from his mission would have been to invite a bullet behind the ear, despite the losses they had so far suffered. The task force still had a battalion of marines and the naval gunfire support of the destroyer and frigates. Once the Hokum gunship returned he would refuel it and send it back up to locate and destroy the reported heavy guns. Obviously a drastic rethink would be required in order to snatch success from defeat and he had leant over the chart table, scrutinising the map of the islands and ordering the radars switched on. He needed their eyes to see whatever else the damned Filipinos had lurking in the wings.

To the south of the PLAN ships, five Sea Lynx helicopters under the control of their AEW Sea King had sprinted in at wave top height and loosed off two Penguin anti-shipping missiles apiece before racing back to their motherships to rearm. When the PLAN radars came up the missiles were skimming the waves and only a thousand yards out, the radars painted the incoming vampires and six fast approaching Singaporean missile patrol boats eighteen miles away. Three of the Penguins slammed into the southernmost PLAN frigate; five struck the destroyer whilst the waterlines of the Tinxu and the second frigate were holed by a missile apiece.

Penguin anti-shipping missiles are smaller and lighter than the Harpoon, they lack the destructive power to wreak havoc on a ships superstructure as the bigger missile does, instead it aims for the waterline where the sea will assist it. Small warheads or no, five holes in the port side of the destroyers’ hull at the waterline caused an almost immediate list, as did the strikes on the southernmost frigate. One detrimental effect on those ships fighting abilities was to greatly reduce the range of their radars to port as neither array had self-stabilising gimbals. With their electronic eyes sweeping well above the horizon to starboard, and well below it to port, neither ship could attack the Singaporean vessels or even defend against their missiles until they were within five miles.

Contrary to all expectations the invasion had been repulsed and the invaders routed, the spirit of Rajah Lapu-Lapu would have looked down with pride at what had occurred on the site of his own victory, and so close to its anniversary.

At 1545hrs the Singaporean surface combat ships and their charges came within view of the colonels’ telescope. Trailing behind those ships was a pair of LC (I)s, Landing Craft (Infantry) carrying the survivors from the PLAN vessels which had gone from being formidable warships, to mere ‘hazards to shipping’ bulletins for ships charts updates on coastal waters wrecks.

Emerging into the sunlight, a hire van exited the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel and crossed Battery Park, making its way to West Street and then north to Chelsea. The driver and passenger were both white Caucasian’s in their late twenties with mid-west accents, but the driver drove confidently in the big city traffic, a cap tilted down over his forehead and an elbow resting on the sill. Going a short way up Tenth Street the driver stopped the van in traffic whilst the passenger pulled the peak of his baseball cap down, then jogged from the van to another hired van. This second van had been slightly longer than the one he had exited, ensuring the problem free transfer into the space of the shorter vehicle. Motorists behind the van that obstructed their free passage made their feelings felt in the usual New York way by leaning on car horns and yelling out of open windows. The first vans passenger had pulled out of the space and forward just far enough before stopping and running back, to guard the vacated area against opportunist parkers. He’d waved and smiled at the car drivers behind, ignoring their vocal protests whilst the first van had reversed into the space. With apologetic waves the two men hurried back to the second van drove off, circling around to head back the way they had come. One hour later a 500lb bomb inside the parked van exploded whilst a nearby bar and diner’s trade were at the lunchtime peak, killing forty-three and injuring another ninety, of whom many were local residents and passers-by. That target of the bombers was dock workers from the piers beside the Hudson River were having their lunch breaks in the two establishments.

In Canada, a barracks outside of Halifax was mortared with heavy loss of life; the mortars used where prefabricated from steel piping and had been fired remotely.

Outside a hotel in San Francisco, the crew of a federalised airliner was machine gunned by the pillion passenger of a motorbike, as they awaited their transport to the airport where they were scheduled to fly troops to Australia.

All across the United States and Canada that morning orchestrated acts of sabotage and terrorism were carried out, targeting the war effort and the workers who sustained it, be they military or civilian.

Three hundred and eighty miles off the eastern seaboard, Major Glenn Morton checked the gauges before him and eased back a fraction on the throttle, easing away from the big KC-135 tanker. “Trident One is full tummy… thanks for the drink Texaco!”

The big ALASAT hung below the belly of the F-15C as he moved back on station, awaiting the call to launch on another surveillance satellite.

The stockpile of the weapons had risen to ten in the past couple of days and the plan was to knock down all the satellites that China and Russia had in orbit. That meant they needed rather more than they had available at present, plus of course the enemy could always launch more, but Glenn reckoned they had to start somewhere and here was as good a place as any to begin.

“Trident One this is Yoda… steer zero eight four degrees and buster, you are weapons hot.” Glenn went to full afterburner to build up airspeed whilst punching in the commands for the big missiles tracking, acquisition and launch program. They hadn’t given him another Angels to climb to in preparation for the launch so he pulled back into the correct 55’ climb required by the launch profile.

He was carrying one of the new weapons today and the powers that be were confident that an expensive double shot at the target was unnecessary. The missiles had been tested a dozen times and were being kept under the tightest possible guard until uploaded onto the airframes.

At 40,000 feet Major Glenn Morton was anticipating the ALASATs growl in his ear on its eventual acquisition of its target, when there was a bright flash accompanied by momentary, yet intense pain.

Trident One disappeared from the radar screens at the same time as the ground/air data link ceased. The missile had not malfunctioned; it had not even acquired the RORSAT it was intended to destroy.

Under the circumstances, all nine remaining F-15Cs of the ASAT squadron were grounded pending an enquiry. When a USAF officer, a graduate of the Air Force Academy, on the air force guard detail responsible for guarding the airframes failed to appear for his next rostered duty, all the aircraft were inspected minutely. It took a full day to find that all of the F-15Cs had custom made explosive devices with altimeter triggers, secreted next to wing tanks.

In Washington DC, the search for survivors had not lasted as long as it would have done under peacetime conditions. With so many collapsed buildings a level had had to be found, a point where someone had to say, enough, and move on to the next building. The rescue workers were working under the very real danger of death and lasting harm from the existing conditions, despite the protective clothing that provided some barrier against radiation. Bomb damaged buildings have a nasty habit of falling on people who are disturbing the delicate balance of rubble that may be supporting damaged walls, in their search for trapped survivors. In view of the danger, only volunteers were working in the rescue teams, and to their everlasting credit, every able body in the police and fire departments had stepped forward when the situation was explained. The National Guard had more volunteers than it had protective clothing for them to wear. Construction workers, doctors, nurses and paramedics also numbered amongst the volunteers.

Quite incredibly, some law firms had sent ambulance chasers to the city and refugee camps to persuade victims and relatives that the overloaded emergency services, doctors and nurses, had not done enough to find victims in the rubble, not done enough to save limbs or alleviate suffering. Pending lawsuits were estimated at over $200 billion in damages against the police and fire departments, hospitals, the National Guard and civilian volunteers. The lawyers and para-legals descended upon the grieving and those in pain, thrusting pens into shocked hands and legal papers before stunned eyes.

At one such tented refugee city, two smartly dressed representatives of the legal firm of Zxul, Stroppel and Hext, approached a middle-aged man who sat on a canvas camp chair. The camp was situated in fields ten miles outside the city limits, and despite the short length of time it had been in existence; over twenty thousand pairs of feet had trampled away the grass into the wet earth below, creating muddy tracks between the green tents.

The young man and young woman wore designer business suits and Italian footwear, with mud now marring their hand tooled finish. The leather document case’s they carried bore genuine designer labels and everything they wore was genuine, with the exception of their expressions of sympathetic concern.

The target of their interest had hair matted with brick and cements dust and grasped a newspaper in his right hand. His clothes were filthy and torn, his footwear which was a size too large, had been issued to him by a charity here at the camp, his own shoes were buried beneath the rubble of a hotel. On his lap sat a battered carry-on bag and the expression he wore was obvious to the most insensitive person as one of abject misery and loss. It was this very expression that had drawn the two toward him, along with his apparent age; after all, if he had lost wife, children and grandchildren, then he was a potential multi-million dollar claimant.

He listened to their spiel and answered their questions in a monotone, and in their turn the lawyers hid well their disappointment that he had no grandchildren, only his wife, a son and a daughter buried beneath the collapsed hotel where they had been staying.

“Who you gonna sue then?” asked Rudi Pelham.

“Well, I understand the emergency services and National Guard had only thirty men and women working on the site of your hotel, and they gave up after twelve hours’, hardly enough time for a competent search!” the smartly dressed young woman stated.

“Criminal, just criminal.” her partner tutted in support, shaking his head as he did so.

“What about the guys who let the bomb off… what about the guys who started all of this… it was communists started it… right?”

The young woman kept the exasperation out of her voice and expression as she explained.

“The police, the fire department… all the emergency services have a duty of care… it doesn’t matter who caused this… we think we can prove that your family may have suffered terribly if they were still alive, as they probably were, when the rescuers abandoned them.”

Rudi Pelham looked at them a moment, before withdrawing from his bag a small photograph album and handing it over.

“In there are some of the best, most loyal friends I ever had.” The pair feigned interest as they flicked over the pages, not really seeing the once youthful face of the man before them, the screaming eagle patch he wore with pride on his jungle fatigues, or the young men with him.

“Communists killed my friends in Vietnam at a place called the Ia Drang valley, communists killed my wife and son and youngest daughter in Washington DC… ” He handed over the newspaper, which the woman smoothed out to show the story of the destruction of the USS John F Kennedy group.

“… Communists killed my oldest daughter in the North Pacific… but do you know something?”

Both lawyers looked at him, or rather at the old Colt .45 automatic that he had taken from the bag.

“I have more respect for their killers than I have for you two… the people who killed them did at least have an ideal that they believed in. They didn’t let their lust for greenbacks, drive them to destroy the brave men and women who are doing a job that may result in their own deaths, from falling masonry or cancer.”

Even had the old souvenir of the Vietnam War not distracted them, it is debatable if they would have understood his words, as their creed was so far removed from his. Rudi saw this as he looked into their faces, he saw that these people believed in nothing and nobody but the value of money, no matter what the damage and harm they may cause in acquiring it. Duty to anything but monetary profit was the pastime of suckers, losers and defendants in civil actions.

The contempt on his face sounded a warning bell in the male lawyers’ brain and he turned to run, abandoning his partner and dropping his smart document case in the mud as he did so.

Rudi shot the man twice between the shoulder blades before he could run ten feet and then the young woman through the heart, before turning the gun on himself.

The low orbit RORSAT that had been saved by the actions of the Russian deep cover operative swept across the ocean and downloaded the radar data it carried via a communications satellite. Two hours’ later the three Soviet submarine Wolf packs had the information and began moving into position to meet the convoys from Canada, New York and Texas.

A stack of files sat before the president, each contained an option for carrying the war back to the enemy in Asia and that was something he dearly wished to do. His military advisors had counselled on re-grouping first, marking their ground and holding it whilst building up resources for a fighting return, but he harboured hope of a faster solution anyway.

He had withdrawn to his own quarters, though that was a rather grand description, taking with him some two dozen of the buff folders to peruse.

Each of the files carried on the third page a précis of the operation and after reading four he came to realise that someone had dealt a hand of wild cards to some free thinkers and briefed them to let their imaginations have full rein of the proposals. He wasn’t a soldier but he did not allow that to cloud his judgement, he worked purely off logic as he passed his eye quickly over each, made an assessment and assigned them one of three stacks. Promising, Credible and Incredible.

The Incredible pile outweighed the Credible and the promising stack held just four. The file that held his attention of them all proposed using a large island in a similar fashion as that of the British Isles in World War 2, as a staging point for attacks and possibly even to assemble an invasion force there.

He would keep that file for General Shaw to assign a planning team to. It was possibly their best means of reversing their losses in his eyes and therefore worth serious consideration for expending assets and resources on.

Just so long as Taiwan stood unconquered.

The sound of man-made thunder reverberated down from the north, echoing off the valley walls of the Hsüeh-shan Shan-mo mountains south of Taipei.

The only areas of the island not occupied by the People’s Republic of China was now north of two rivers that ran out of the mountains, the Cho-shui to the east and the T’ou-ch’ien on the west of the island. The southern tip of the island was also denied to them by hard fighting ROCs and civilian volunteers defending their homes.

Taiwan stood alone, the resupply flights of Patriot missiles had ceased several days before, and there was now no challenge to the steady rain of incoming enemy missiles, which landed every fifteen minutes.

In response to public and political pressure US military forces had, over several years previously, been withdrawn from Taiwanese territory. The same situation existed throughout the region, with the exception of South Korea. The US military garrison’s, airbases and naval installations had been drawing back in scale since the seventies until they existed in token only.

The Taiwanese troops dug in along the defence line had heard that morning that the Japanese Island of Okinawa had fallen during the night. Four days before in a spookily similar situation to the landings in 1945, elements of the PRC Tenth Army landed on Higashi beach, where the US Tenth army had landed fifty-seven years before. Unlike that earlier conflict, Japanese defence forces had not been able to mount the same fierce resistance; the attack from Mainland China on her island neighbours had been too much of a surprise and the PRC too well informed of troop dispositions and defences. Reported atrocities against the civilian populace were unverified by independent sources, yet the Tenth Army’s VI and VII brigades who had carried out the landings, were known to be the Penal Units of the People’s Liberation Army of China.

Huddled down in the bunkers and trenches of the Taiwanese final defence line, many a soldier or the naval and air force personnel pressed into service as infantry now that the ships, aircraft and installations were no more, checked watches as 1200hrs drew near.

From the plain in the west, across the mountains to the eastern shores there existed a graveyard of men and machines from both sides. For the past five days the armed forces of Taiwan, the ROCs, had given ground only when the alternative was that of being overrun. The PRC had split the island, and its forces, in two. The forces in the south had their backs to the sea as they held the last ten miles of the tapered southern tip; the front line there was the town of Ch’e-ch’eng.

The northern line was forty miles from the capital but it was the last natural barrier of any substance. Taiwan had no ships left with which to stem the flow of equipment, men and supplies from the mainland. A determined effort had been made before the invasion had been a day old, to snuff it out by driving the PLAN ships from coastal waters, but although they had sunk troop transports and warships, it had failed and cost them dearly. Swarms of PLAAF fighters had swamped the navy air cover almost as soon as it had taken to the air. They had started the day with a surface combat fleet of four Kidd class air defence destroyers, twenty-nine frigates of the Perry, Lafayette, Knox and Gearing classes plus sixty-nine missile and patrol boats. None of the destroyers or frigates had got within range to engage the invasion fleet, only fast manoeuvrable missile boats had managed that but of those that had gotten within range, none had returned. The three surviving air defence destroyers had been given anti-ballistic missile duties protecting Taipei and Chiang Kai Shek airport, where the last one had been sunk by a PLAN submarine the day before.

Sixteen frigates had been sunk during the attack on the invasion fleet and the remainders were picked off by air attacks over the following three days, as had the last of the missile and patrol boats.

Two of Taiwan’s four submarines were tasked with the removal to safety the countries gold and diamond reserves, whilst the last two now sat in Taipei harbour with just their conning towers above the surface awaiting the members of the government seeking to continue in exile.

Just after prior to midnight almost ten hours’ before, the PRC had issued an ultimatum to surrender by 1200hrs that day or they would do unto Taipei and the Taiwanese what Genghis Khan had done to Beijing and its citizens in the year 1215. Surrender or die was the Mogul chieftains’ favoured phrase.

Since the landings, over 23,000 Taiwanese troops had been killed or wounded in the land battles. PLA losses were twice that number but with the constant barrage of missiles on Taiwan’s town and cities, the civilian casualties evened the score. The night attacks by the PRC army and air force had ceased at midnight although the monotonous rumble of detonating missiles on the capital had continued unabated and unchallenged. The few surviving Patriot sites had run out of missiles two days before.

At two minutes to twelve a missile landed in the filthy waters of Taipei harbour, exploding close enough to drench the captain and crewmen of a submarine as they waited on the last boatloads of members of the government going into exile, but causing no damage other than to nerves already frayed. Forty miles to the south the ROCs prepared for the promised attack that the PRC boasted would overwhelm them, and at that distance the detonation in the harbour did not reach them as those that struck land had.

At 1213hrs the last of the passengers were clambering up the sides of the conning towers and the citizens of Taipei were bracing themselves for the next high explosive warhead to land. Taiwan shook and the skies to the north and south lit up with the unbearable brightness of five-megaton warhead's air bursting at an altitude of 10,000’.