James Rouch - Sky Strike

FROM: GENERAL PAKOVSKI-OFFICER

COMMANDING AIR DEFENCE REGIMENTS – CENTRAL SECTOR – ZONE

Transmission. Priority. By Special General Staff Code AP/43. Secure link or hand only

Comrade Lieutenant General.

Acting on Intelligence information passed by your office and following orders issued by yourself the action listed below has been carried out:

The 867th (reinforced) light anti-aircraft battalion: the 12th anti-aircraft missile regiment: the 727th armoured medium anti-aircraft regiment: have been moved to cover the rail junction and marshalling yards at Kothen.

All movements have been made by night under conditions of strict radio silence. Counter-intelligence measures have been taken to prevent the enemy detecting the redeployment.

All battery commanders have been ordered not to activate their radar systems until the destruction of our light screen of radar pickets signals the imminent approach of the expected NATO attack.

Under these conditions our main defences will survive to engage the enemy force at close range, when their destruction will be assured.

As required, I can give the Comrade Lieutenant General my personal assurance that not a single capitalist mercenary will survive the implementation of this plan. I am moving my own HQ to a site near Kothen to maintain the closest possible supervision.

Libby kept a tight grip on the mini-gun, as the slipstream buffeted the heavy cluster of barrels projecting through the open cabin door of the helicopter.

The eastern fringes of the Zone were below them now, an ugly land, banded by swathes of chemically stunted sickly vegetation. A whole forest lay flattened, the stripped and charred trunks laid in patterns that marked the paths of massive blast waves from a nuclear bomb or missile burst.

Among the clumps of yellow foliage Libby could see occasional patches of green, where some hardy plant was using the new strength of spring to restart its battle for survival.

There were no targets for the snaking belt of mixed armour-piercing and tracer rounds. They had been told at the briefing there wouldn’t be, but he was disappointed all the same.

He leant out, and damp air rushing past pushed against his visor and sucked the air from beneath it, so he had to gasp for breath. Visibility was improving fast as the sun rose higher. When he looked back he could see the second wave of the assault, five miles behind them and stretching away to north and south, bank after bank of Black Hawks and Chinooks, many with under slung loads.

A Soviet scout car swerved from the track along which it had been making its lonely patrol as the choppers swept overhead, at a hundred feet their massed rotors sending the plants and puddles into wild waving motion.

It was gone before he could sight on it, but he gripped the multi-barrelled gun tighter, in expectation of other opportunities soon.

Now they crossed the rusting wire and overgrown minefields of the old Iron Curtain, and then they were over East Germany and the helicopter sank to fifty feet as it raced above the ill-kept fields and dilapidated villages, following every contour of the rolling land.

‘Will you look at this?’ Ripper rubbed the fabric of his camouflage top between a filthy thumb and forefinger. ‘This is all brand new, it’s just like we were going to a party.’

‘Command must have heard we were having trouble getting you to wash, so they figured the only way to get you clean was to change your nappy.’ Digging Andrea in the ribs with his elbow, Dooley waited for the laugh he considered his due. It didn’t come.

‘Twenty minutes to the DZ. Check your weapons.’ Revell came back into the cabin from the cockpit. He carried his new 12-gauge assault rifle cradled in his arms. Four of the big drum magazines hung from his tight-hitched belt. Standing with his legs apart, he needed no hand-hold to counter the motion of the Black Hawk as it maintained maximum speed.

A burst of rapid automatic fire was audible from the next chopper in line. Libby couldn’t see the other door gunner’s target, but watched the arc of tracer spiral down to a farmyard. Smoke and a bubble of red flame were rising above the roofs as it was lost to view.

Bombardier Cline was finding it difficult to stay on the seat he had improvised from a stack of spare flak-jackets, teetering back and forth at every slight turbulence.

‘Frightened of losing something, Bomber?’ Pretending not to hear, Cline ignored Dooley. The big oaf was just letting off steam, no point in getting involved in a slanging match with him. Not only could he not be certain of winning, it would look bad in front of the Yank officer.

Noise and vibration rippled through the hull as the mini-gun unleashed fifty rounds. Sergeant Hyde moved to the door and looked out past their gunner. A fast settling plume of mud and debris partly obscured a sandbag-protected light flak-cannon. There was hardly time for it to register before it was gone.

It wasn’t possible for Hyde to tell if the weapon had been hit and damaged, probably it had, judging by the amount of muck that had been thrown up around it, but one thing was certain, it had been unmanned. His shouted warning to conserve ammunition was drowned by the roar of jets as a pair of A10 Thunderbolts, from the squadrons assigned to fly Wild Weasel flak, SAM and radar suppression missions, zipped past, deposited their entire load of externally carried stores on a seemingly innocuous stretch of woodland, and pulled sharply up and away into the sun.

Eyes watering, Libby watched the parachute-retarded fall of the cluster and fragmentation bombs. Just above the tree tops, each disintegrated: the cluster munitions into their hundreds of deadly and variously delayed bomblets and the daisy cutters into their millions of razor-sharp fragments.

‘They said we wouldn’t see much opposition. Looks like the Airforce is determined to reduce that to none at all.’ Through the smoke Hyde could discern the hulls of several tracked SAM missile launchers, a whole battery. Some were partially buried by the trunks and foliage that had been intended to merely conceal them. More trees were falling, toppling across trucks and trailers already damaged by blast and fragments. Several spread-eagled bodies were fleetingly visible.

As the scene of the devastation was left behind they flew over a collection of a dozen Zil and Tatra trucks, all of them burning fiercely. Flames rose high, to lick about the radar dishes and masts on their roofs.

‘Looks like our flyers poked out the Commies’ eyes before coming back to hit the hardware.’ Libby saw the handful of troops attempting to tackle the fire throw away their extinguishers and run as the chopper squadrons beat past overhead.

Now, save for where it persisted in a few scattered hollows, the mist had dispersed.

‘Kothen in ten minutes. If Intelligence has got it right, we’re through the main anti-aircraft defences. From here on in it’ll just be random light stuff.’ Revell declined the mint Ripper was offering. ‘No, thanks. I’ve seen the effect they have on others.’

Only Clarence accepted, pausing from checking the ammunition clips for his Enfield Enforcer sniper rifle to take two. He put both in his mouth at once and chewed vigorously without change of expression, to Ripper’s obvious disappointment.

Twice they passed over military convoys and both times Libby made ready to return fire, but there was none. It might be different for the second wave. Several transporters and field cars sported pintle-mounted heavy machine guns.

Hardly any civilian traffic was to be seen, apart from the occasional tractor or cart-towing pushbike.

A few handfuls of livestock stampeded at the helicopters’ approach, running into fences and streams in their panic. For a moment Libby was tempted to put a burst into a scattering herd of cattle, but held back. Hyde was still close by, and the sergeant came down hard on needless expenditure of ammunition, very hard.