James Rouch: Death March

“Time to get out.” Major Revell gathered up two fragmentation grenades he had laid beside his scrape and snaked backwards from their cover. “They’ll know about the hedge, and were we really are, now.”

As he led the squad, all running bent double, the first retaliatory 105mm rounds fell just short of the hedge. Before they were clear of the field that first smattering of explosions had transformed in to a deluge that hid and swiftly obliterated their recent position.

The sign-written panel van was still parked in the service station access road beneath the trees. A civilian who had climbed in to the cab and was searching for a means of starting the Volvo jumped out and ran when he saw the squad approaching, others leapt from the back, empty handed, having found nothing to loot.

A single shot from Andrea hastened their departure, the bullet grazing the would-be drivers arm and eliciting a yelp of pain and panic.

“That’s enough.” Revell grabbed the barrel of her Colt pistol and prevented her taking a second, more carefully aimed shot. “The civvies are not our problem.”

The drive back in to the city was a nightmare. Nurnberg’s roads were clogged with refugees from the Russians sudden onslaught. Frequent craters were rimmed with torn flesh and the dead and dying. Twice they passed through roadblocks manned by nervous conscript West German infantry who looked unlikely to stand their ground when the Russians reached them. The barricades were hastily erected and composed mostly of civilian commercial vehicles loosely linked together with assorted debris taken from nearby out-houses and stores. They looked no more likely to withstand the first Russian attack than their guards. At the second a Leopard tank, its engine running, covering a tangle of poorly positioned barbed wire in the road. The motor was constantly revved, as if the driver just waited for the command to reverse out and make his way back.

No attempt was being made to check the flood of people coursing through the defensive positions. As Burke nosed the panel van forward there was a constant thumping on the sides as some implored a ride, and from others being squeezed to the edge of the road. At the open rear doors Andrea and Dooley kept weapons levelled at the crowds, pointing them menacingly at any who came too close, using the barrels to rap the knuckles of those who tried too board. There was a bang from beneath the rear of the vehicle, and then a second as another of the offside twin wheels deflated.

“They’ve punctured our tyres, spiteful lot. We’re going no where further in this wagon”. Wrenching the wheel over, Burke parked the Volvo across a picket fence bordering a garden.

Assembling the squad, Major Revell saw there was no progress to be made on the road and struck out through the rear of the properties towards the city centre. Behind them a mortar shell impacted on the roadblock and smoke rose over the buildings. Screams and wailing followed them as more bombs fell on the road. The sounds were swiftly smothered as a torrent of rounds impacted.

“This is a mess.” Sergeant Hyde listened to salvoes of heavy calibre rockets flying overhead. The flame tails of the big missiles were briefly visible as they sped towards their targets in the suburbs, leaving white vapour trails. They came in successive waves.

“We knew that when they sent us forward with no orders except to try and create that road block.” Revell set a fast pace, trying to anticipate a safe path between the areas being saturated by artillery fire. He was succeeding more by luck than judgement. The Russian gunners appeared more interested in expending the contents of their ammunition dumps rather than indulging in precision bombardment.

Rounds of every description and calibre were impacting across the housing estates through which they passed. Blocks of apartments burst open as shells plunged through the rooftops and detonated on lower floors. Cascades of phosphorous seared parks and open areas, turning trees in to giant torches and children’s playgrounds in to bizarre flaming tableaux.

Revell and his squad were jogging through hell.

General Zucharnin hammered on his desk, hard enough to make the lamp, some pencils and several drab coloured files jump off. A plump-faced junior officer scurried forward, bent double to retrieve them. The tight material covering her expansive rump drew sideways glances from several of the officers present.

“They have created bottlenecks at every opportunity and consequently have slowed my supply columns to a trickle. A handful of NATO infantry even tricked our gunners in to over-turning a service centre across another of our replenishment routes, completely blocking an autobahn. On top of that NATO have used atomic demolitions to blast major road intersections and rail links on the approaches to the city. Army Command has only given me a handful of helicopters and I can’t switch them from attack missions to scurrying about airlifting ammunition. They can’t be in two places at once. Not that a handful could make any difference. Army Command gave me ammunition supplies of which every Warsaw Pact General has always dreamed. Granted they gave me the sweepings of the stockade to fire it off but the ammunition should have been sufficient to shoot us in to the city and clean through to the other side.”

Again his fist pounded the desk and he scowled fiercely at the young woman when she had the temerity to lean forward and put her dimpled hand on a pile of papers to prevent them falling. “And now that advantage is being lost to me because you pitiful fools can’t keep my convoy routes open.”

“Where possible General we are using the contents of over-run enemy ammunition dumps. And the fuel situation is being eased by utilising the contents of civilian gas stations. We are doing everything and anything possible to ease the supply problem Considerable numbers of enemy soft skin vehicles have been captured and we are also impressing civilian vehicles in huge numbers…”

The colonel who spoke mopped his fat Slavic features with a heavy silk maroon handkerchief that came close to matching the mottled colour of his complexion.

“It is ammunition I need. I don’t want those scum in the punishment battalions farting around taking driving lesson. Half of them would drive straight out of the Zone on the far side and surrender to the first NATO road sweeper they see.”

His fist sore from the continual thundering on the wood, the General resorted to furiously shaking the bunch of fat hairy knuckles at his staff officers. “I want my convoys to get through. My assault formations are using their reserve stocks already.”

“The General has been continuously advised of the potential replenishment problems. The original plan always held the risk of the advance slowing if we could not maintain the ammunition supply situation. Had we not been forced to resort to such lavish fire plans…”

Zucharnin bellowed, shouting down the interruption. “The troops I have been given are the dregs. Third-rate infantry with no supporting armour worth mentioning. To replace fighting skills I am having to pour in torrents of artillery fire to support every infantry engagement. That’s when we can get the bastards to fight. I have already issued orders for several battalion commanders to be arrested and shot. The plan will work, I will make it work if I have to put every officer up against a wall, staff officers as well.” He glared. “The plan though will count for nothing if my ammunition convoys are held up at every blocked crossroad.”

He snarled at an open file on his desk, knowing the figures without having to scan them again. The Army Command had allotted to him infantry who were of the lowest calibre. And what little armour he had been given was all drawn from reserve stocks, obsolete, worn out with crews to match. The lavish quantities of ammunition and several regiments of artillery from Corps reserve were the only real help he had been given.