James Rouch: Death March

“The situation called for…special measures, but an operation went wrong and an important piece of equipment has been lost. It shouldn’t have happened, but it did. Something…something very important, has been lost behind enemy lines.”

Revell sensed that Colonel Lippincott was very uncomfortable. He had paced as he had mumbled through the introduction and preamble now he sat behind his desk and kept glancing at the sour faced Intelligence Officer who was also present. The Colonel was measuring his words, as if afraid he might say too much, as if the Intelligence Officer was monitoring his every word.

Saying nothing, Revell was enjoying the situation. More used to being on the receiving end of disciplinary blasts from his commanding officer, this was very different and he waited with interest to see what was coming. Getting the summons had not surprised him.

After the trouble at the repair shop he had anticipated problems originating from some pen pushing senior officer ready to castigate him. It might have been for any reason, perhaps for causing a delay in the repair of a favoured piece of luxury transport, maybe a sports car promised to a wife or mistress. Or perhaps the complex arrangements for shipping out such a trophy had been disrupted or delayed.

But it had been very quickly become abundantly clear it wasn’t that. No general was on the warpath, not this time. Colonel Lippincotts’ manner strongly suggested he was deeply unhappy about something. Maybe there was some crap mission in the air and the Special Combat Force had drawn the short straw, but Revell couldn’t guess why that should bother his commanding officer. It never had before.

“I have a job for you.” The Colonel kept glancing to the stiff backed officer beside him, as if he suspected he was keeping secret notes. “The Soviet advance was faster than we expected. Intelligence…” Here again the Colonel half looked towards the ramrod officer who flanked him, “…had reported only the presence of second rate units opposite this sector. Their sudden advance, employing massive fire power… it wasn’t anticipated.”

Taking out a handkerchief, the Colonel looked as if he was about to mop his brow with it, but he appeared to decide against and instead wrung it between his hands, twisting the crisp white cotton into a creased, damp, mass. He took yet another sideways glance before going on.

“Circumstances forced us to employ exceptional measures… It was decided to take out an important road junction to the east of the city that the Warpac forces would need for their principle convoy route. You know what it has been like out there. Their assault units and artillery were expending ammunition at a prodigious rate. It’s a tactic they’ve used before, just pouring in fire indiscriminately, keeping the refugees moving, panicking, getting in our way. If they’d had any decent armour they’d have rolled right over us. As it was we cobbled together some scratch units, slowed them down and managed to blow the river bridges in their face.”

Colonel Lippincott was speaking slower than usual, exchanging his usual rapid-fire delivery for a more measured style. It was like he was allowing the Intelligence Officer to step in at any point if he wanted to, if he was saying too much.

The tactics outlined were ones the Russians had applied frequently, Revell was well aware of that, though usually it had relied heavily on a massive air assault component and tank division. Those had been conspicuously absent on this occasion.

Certainly they had been using the maximum weight of firepower to keep a situation fluid, unleashing torrents of automatic fire to stampede civilians trying to flee the zone as it expanded.

The refugees in turn would make it difficult for NATO to set up roadblocks and defensive positions before they were swept aside by the stampeding and terrified population.

“But it is a tactic that only works if they can be rapidly re-supplied and this time their expenditure of ammunition has been prodigious.” Lippincott looked full at the man beside him as though hoping for some congratulation on saying the right thing, or for not saying too much. “Usually if the need is urgent then their helicopter fleet would be employed. In this case even their best efforts would not be sufficient to maintain the ammunition levels required and actually on this front the Commies seem particularly short on rotary wing aircraft. So they are relying on columns of trucks to rush ammunition forward. In fact they have commandeered every scrap of civilian transport they can lay their hands on. They’re turning the roads into one-way systems, loaded vehicles entering the city by one route, empty ones leaving by another. It’s the same system the Red Ball express employed in France during the Second World War. It’s highly effective if the roads can be kept open.”

Getting no assistance from the Intelligence officer, the Colonel turned to look at a large-scale map on the wall. “This is an old city, lots of winding roads, not many direct routes through it from east to west. We knew the way those convoys would be forced to come.”

At this point he wiped his face and his throat, pushing the edge of the material inside the collar of his shirt were the colour had darkened with the sweat that was soaking it.

“By demolishing a handful of junctions and bridges we have been slowing the Soviets, creating one hell of a logistics problem for them and reducing the flow of ammunition to a trickle. But this last time…something went wrong.”

This pause was longer, and it stretched out. Revell saw the Colonels’ hands were twitching. After a long pause the Intelligence Officer stepped in.

“A special unit was tasked with blocking a potential Warpac route on the edge of the city, where their traffic would be critically concentrated and vulnerable. A small commando unit parachuted in with a specialist who had a device that would do the job. His aircraft was downed but we know he jumped just before that. His ground beacon functioned for a few minutes then went off the air. We don’t know what happened to him or his… device. It’s reasonable to assume though that he and his three-man escort are KIA. They were a tough lot, the roughest, and would have gone down fighting rather than surrender. In fact its possible his escort were lost when the aircraft was hit, that they never got to jump.”

“You’ve lost an atomic demolition weapon! Right?”

At Revells’ interjection the Intelligence officer stiffened, his jaw setting tight and his lips compressing.

“It will save time if you just tell me.” Revell could see why Colonel Lippincott was so uncomfortable. This was knowledge usually confined to the very highest levels and the men carrying out the mission.

The Colonel said nothing but nodded. Once, barely moving his head, and then twice more, vigorously, as though to say he knew the situation but was happy to let some one else explain it.

“We know the device was delivered to its intended detonation point, or close to it, and that the arming sequence had commenced. Automatic signals relayed via satellite confirmed that. But from just moments afterwards we don’t know what happened to the weapon.”

“You want me and my unit to go in and retrieve it? Or is it still the plan to set it off?” Revells’ first thought was to wonder just how much of what was obviously coming he would be allowed to tell his squad.

“I shall be straight with you major. The best-case scenario would be to retrieve it. And it’s a job we want you to do, with some specialist help.”

The Intelligence officer had a dry voice that somehow sounded like he was about to clear his throat any moment but was too polite to do so in company.