The Fall of Night

Chapter Thirty-Three: The End of the European Dream

Near Madgeburg, Germany

“Let me get this straight,” Generalmajor Günter Mühlenkampf snapped. His voice was understandably annoyed. “You are basically heading to the English Channel, whatever else happens, and I am invited to take my men and come with you? Right?”

Captain Stuart Robinson nodded once, briefly. The retreat from Poland had been nightmarish, even with the addition of a handful of other stragglers from Germany, France and even Spain. Mathews’ brief low-powered radar sweeps had revealed an enemy aerial presence that dwarfed anything they'd seen on exercises, or even when the Americans had moved into Iran. There had been thousands of aircraft in the sky, from fighters on patrol to transports moving Russian soldiers forward to the battlezone. They’d kept their heads down and inched west.

It hadn’t been easy. They had had to shoot down a Russian bomber that had located them and that had brought more attention to their general location; the ‘Devil’s Cross’ aircraft, the Russian copy of the A-10 Warthog, had hunted for them with deadly determination. Luck had been with them; the Russians had missed them, that time. A day later, they had stumbled into a Russian patrol; the Russians had been just as surprised and both sides had broken off the contact after a brief exchange of fire. They had reached a German military camp only to discover that it was in ruins; they had decided to avoid the cities and keep moving. Along a deserted autobahn, they had encountered German Military Police, who had escorted them to Mühlenkampf’s camp; Robinson had taken a deep breath of relief before realising that the Germans were in worse condition than his men.

Mühlenkampf had explained it, on their first meeting; the Germans had received the main brunt of Russian malice. Robinson, who had been in Poland, had his doubts about that, but it hardly mattered. The Bundeswehr had been battered right from day one; a combination of riots and insurgencies in the cities, mixed with air and missile attacks. Mühlenkampf himself had been lucky; as far as he knew, he was the only surviving German General Officer… and the seven hundred men under his command, all from scattered units, the largest surviving German body. He had been bitter; he’d managed to pull together a larger force, but some of his units had caught the attention of Russian bombers and been pounded into scrap.

Robinson had held out hope… until he had seen Mathews’ success, linking to a civilian satellite that had been able to provide directions for linking into an American military communications satellite that had been loaned to Britain. The laser-link had been established and a great deal of information had been downloaded, more than Robinson would normally have expected from anyone. The Russians were grinding their way into Germany from two directions at once… and unless his force moved now, they would be caught and destroyed.

“Yes, I suppose you could put it that way,” he said, turning back to Mühlenkampf. The German had an unfortunate name for many reasons; he didn’t deserve to be abandoned. He felt shame, mixed with an odd combination of impatience; the men under his command deserved better than to be thrown away in a fruitless last stand. They would fight like mad bastards if they were cornered, but he wanted to avoid a last stand if it was even remotely possible. “Orders are orders.”

Mühlenkampf glared at him. “The Fatherland is under attack,” he said. He didn’t seem anything like old enough to remember the long period of Soviet occupation and East German repression, but his father-in-law didn’t look that old either. He wondered briefly what had happened to Hazel and her father; the military link didn’t allow them any time for personal messages. He could only hope that she was safe. “I have a duty to defend it.”

Robinson stared around the camp. It didn’t look like a military camp, something that probably worked in its favour; the Russians had bombed, for no apparent reason, a German Boy Scout camp. It had probably looked like a military camp from the air or some reason like that; even the Russians wouldn’t have killed a few dozen children if they had known that that was what they were doing. Mühlenkampf’s camp had a handful of heavy tanks, all carefully camouflaged, a few dozen smaller vehicles, some of them without fuel, and the British CADS. The handful of soldiers from other countries brought even less to the coming confrontation.

On cue, a rumble of thunder split the air.

He had studied the downloaded information and passed all of it onto Mühlenkampf. His own experience with military matters had convinced him that the Russians were running the risk of friction — the effect of small failures acuminating to make operations delayed or impossible — but it looked intimidating on the map. The Russians would either cut Germany in half or they would seal the escaping British units off from retreat; if that happened, it would be time for a last stand. He had no illusions; the most his force could do would be to slow the Russians down for a few minutes.

“Answer me a question,” he said finally. “Can you defend it?”

Mühlenkampf’s face worked furiously. Robinson felt sorry for him; the admittance that the Germans couldn’t stop the Russians for long had to cost him badly. His force had no communication outside their local area; they might be able to slow the Russians, but in the absence of real air cover, they would get pounded and crushed. There were no supply lines, no reinforcements; he had requested that the Americans provide communications to other German units, but there were only a handful of organised units left. The jamming made it impossible to even call up the reserves, or even offer an amnesty to deserters who returned to duty.

“I have my duty,” he said finally. “My men are all volunteers; they decided to stay with me and fight.”

“Come with us,” Robinson insisted. The Russians would notice them leaving, but they had the CADS for air cover; they might even pick up other anti-aircraft units if they looked organised. “We can get to Britain and use it as a springboard to regain Europe…”

“Don’t be foolish,” Mühlenkampf said, dryly. Robinson was reminded helplessly of Captain Jacob Anastazy; the Pole had left them when they had encountered a scratch force of Polish infantry, preparing to head underground to continue the struggle at a later date. “Unless the Americans get involved… and thanks to our lords and masters, that’s not likely to happen… Germany is lost.”

“We don’t know if that is what will happen,” Robinson urged. “There’s a Frenchman trying to pull together a defence line in France. You could add your forces to that…”

“If we get that far,” Mühlenkampf said. He shook his head. “Do you remember the Iraq War, or Iran?”

“I was barely teething at the time,” Robinson said. “I thought German units weren’t involved in the fighting…”

“There was a small mission sent to observe the Yanks at work,” Mühlenkampf said. “They dominated the skies” — he nodded upwards — “rather like the Russians are dominating our skies, and had weapons that could pick off a single tank from high attitude. The tanks I have here, as far as I know, are the last tanks in Germany… and if I try to move them to England, we will be seen moving and destroyed.”

He nodded towards the east. “That information you brought has the Russians coming down the nearby autobahn,” he said. “We don’t have enough explosives to take down any of the bridges and I don’t want to waste tank shells, but we can ambush the Russians, slow them down, keep hitting them until we run out of fuel, abandon the tanks, and then go underground. It won’t be long before we can set Europe ablaze with resistance to the Russians.”

Robinson hoped that he was right. Aldershot had bashed some military history into his head and he could remember that resistance had been a hit-or-miss affair in the Second World War. The history books had argued backwards and forwards about how important the role of the various resistance groups had been, but it would be a long time before Mühlenkampf could build up the resources needed for an underground war. Unlike Iraq, Europe had no massive stockpiles of basic weapons, left around for just anyone to take; Mühlenkampf would find gathering weapons difficult, at least until the Russians got careless.

“I wish you the best of luck,” Robinson said finally. “I have my orders.”

“Yes,” Mühlenkampf said slowly. “Do you think that you can get the CADS back to Britain?”

Robinson had wondered about that. “You want me to leave them here,” he said. “Can your people operate them?”

“They’re EUROFOR-standard vehicles,” Mühlenkampf said dryly. “There will be soldiers who know how to use them in my force.”

“I’ll just see,” Robinson said. He saluted and wandered towards one of the groups of soldiers, mainly British and French; they stood up and saluted as he approached. They looked tired, battered, and shocked; none of them had really anticipated a weeklong nightmare that wasn’t over yet, if it was ever over. “At ease…”

They relaxed. “We have finally some orders from home,” he informed them. The sense of relief was easy to sense. “We have been ordered to make our way to the coast and hopefully board a ship to return to Britain, in preparation for the time when we will return and kick the Russians arse.” There were some tired chuckles. “The main body of the Germans intend to remain here and fight; I ask now, does anyone want to remain here and join them?”

There was a long pause. “I’ll take that as a no,” Robinson said. “Be ready to move out in one hour.”

He saw Captain Mathews working on one of the CADS. “We have a problem with one of the engines,” he said, shortly. “I think there was something wrong with the last batch of fuel.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Robinson said. “General Mühlenkampf has asked that we leave the CADS behind when we move, as they will be far too easy to spot from the air. If one of them is almost immobile…”

“Yes,” Mathews said. He paused. “I think that he’s right; we do owe him the best chance we can give him… and, anyway, with these engines we might not get this baby to a ship.”

“I asked the others if anyone wanted to remain behind,” Robinson said. “What about you? Mühlenkampf thinks that his people can operate them, and they could just flip on the auto-fire program; do you want to remain behind?”

Mathews hesitated. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “I’ll feel like a heel for running out, but it would be a futile last stand for all of us, so… if I have to die, I want it to be worth something.”

“I know,” Robinson said. Mere words seemed inadequate. “We’re taking the two lorries as far as we can, so get there in an hour with your men, if they don’t want to remain behind. I’m going to report to Mühlenkampf and let him know.”

Mathews lifted an eyebrow. “You’re not going to tell them back home what we’re doing?”

“Of course not,” Robinson said, bitterly. “It would only upset them.

Mühlenkampf was studying a tank when Robinson found him. The Germans had had one lucky break; they had recovered a fuel tanker that had been disabled by a Russian attack, but through sheer luck the fuel hadn’t exploded and added to the damage on the roads. The Russians had strafed several civilian vehicles by accident; all over Germany, people would be running out of fuel. Robinson didn’t want to even think about the effects on civilians, caught up in a meat-grinder; the fools who said that war was glorious had never seen the effects on those caught up in the fighting. Robinson had known the job was dangerous when he had taken it; the civilians had not even been consulted about the war.

Of course not, he thought, as Mühlenkampf stood up. They would have voted against it and did vote against it, but there is no point in passing resolutions in favour of being vegetarian if the wolves are of a different opinion…

Mühlenkampf’s eyes were bitter. “Well?”

Robinson ignored the tone. “You will have the CADS left behind,” he said, fighting down the sense of shame at abandoning both Mühlenkampf and the CADS. “Captain Mathews has agreed to leave them for you — incidentally, something that our orders technically forbid. We also have something else for you; we’re taking one of the satellite phones from the CADS, but the other will remain with you. The American intelligence information will be yours for a while.”

“They’ll cut me off eventually,” Mühlenkampf predicted. “If they don’t get involved, they won’t want to be in the position where they have to say no to me, so they’ll cut me off, just like they do to every group that trusted them and outlived their usefulness.”

Robinson held out a hand. “It’s been interesting,” he said. Mühlenkampf snorted, but took the proffered hand anyway. “I do wish you the best of luck; give them hell, from me.”

The sound of an aircraft echoed in the far distance. “We’ll do the best we can,” Mühlenkampf said. He scowled. “One of my runners has reported Russian tanks probing towards us, so if you don’t mind…?”

“We’ll be on our way,” Robinson said. He led the way towards the two lorries; a handful of soldiers had decided to volunteer to remain behind, leaving him with twenty-one soldiers, and the redoubtable sergeant. The German lorries were open-topped, something that would allow the soldiers a chance to jump for cover if they were detected and attacked; a covered truck might be harder for the Russians to notice, but if the Russians decided to blast it on general principles, his men would be roasted before they could escape. “Good luck, sir.”

He waved as the lorries started their long trip to the west.

They never saw one another again.

The autobahn was massive, large enough to hold four lanes running in each direction, and almost completely deserted. Mühlenkampf watched as his force settled into its position, waiting with inhuman patience for a chance to take a shot at their tormentors. The original series of autobahns, it was generally believed, had been started by Hitler, but that wasn't true; Hitler had only taken an idea from the previous government and run with it. They had thought in terms of military vehicles moving from west to east; later governments had kept one eye on the military possibilities, until the threat from the east had vanished. Europe had built new roads, linking Europe together… and the Russians were using them to invade. Their tanks would smash up large sections of the road, but they wouldn’t care about that; they only cared about speed and the desperate requirement to get as far into Germany as possible.

Mühlenkampf ground his teeth as he waited. He had seen how political correctness had ripped through the Bundeswehr; there was no longer pride in serving Germany. A law had been passed, forbidding his soldiers to wear their uniforms in public; young Germans tried to avoid the military as a career, fearful of being disdained in public by their fellow youths, particularly the girls. The Bundeswehr was hardly the Waffen-SS — they were professional soldiers who acted in professional manners — but they were shunned. Their fellow professionals respected them; what did it say about Germany when they had more respect from foreigners than their own people? What did it all mean anyway?

“Enemy in sight,” the tank crewman shouted. The first Russian tank had appeared… with the sun in their eyes. The Germans had worked hard to camouflage their tanks, but the half-blinded Russians would have more problems seeing them. “At least seven tanks and escorts!”

Mühlenkampf nodded. The Russians had launched a light probe, hunting for resistance; they had helicopters closing in as well, hunting for any resistance on the part of the Germans. They had to be nervous; the Russians, too, respected the German Army. They were probably told tales of how a single SS tank had held up an entire Allied attacking column in the last war with the Germans. Perhaps they had nightmares about Germany; they had certainly worked tooth and nail to keep Germany divided for nearly fifty years.

“Fire,” he ordered calmly.

The Leopold tanks fired as one; seven Russian tanks exploded under their fire. The smaller Russian vehicles scattered, returning fire towards his position; he silently thanked God that he had had the foresight to place his infantry out of sight. Their bullets glanced off the tanks, which returned fire with machine guns, saving their limited stock of shells for worthier targets. Another Russian tank appeared and three of his tanks fired, shattering it under the combined impact of their shells; Mühlenkampf laughed aloud as Russians scattered under his fire. For a moment, he could believe that he was in control…

The Russian helicopters swooped down… only to run into the fire of the CADS. They exploded in midair, their pilots blown away in the second of the missile strike; flaming wreckage fell on the remains of the autobahn. He saw a Russian officer barking orders into a radio and knew what was happening; he barked a quick order of his own and laughed as the Russian staggered and fell, half his head missing. The sniper had hit the target perfectly. His tanks were moving backwards, trying to break contact before the Russians managed to react…

He was still laughing when the first missiles from a Russian MLRS truck landed on his position and blew him to bits.