Seconds felt like minutes. More and more enemy soldiers filtered into the building, yelling out their own orders in Chinese. Sensing that the most opportune moment had arrived, Sergeant Price closed his left eye and sighted in on a man who was waving soldiers forward and directing them where to go; he was most likely an officer. Price applied pressure to the trigger until his rifle barked. Then he watched as the enemy soldier clutched at his chest and fell to the ground.
As soon as Sergeant Price fired his weapon, the two squads’ M240G heavy machine guns and their M27 infantry assault rifles opened fire.
Bang, bang! Ratatat, ratatat, zip, zap, zip, zap!
Red tracer fire crisscrossed from the southeast and northeast corners of the terminal, out toward the main entrance. Their fire completely enveloped the enemy soldiers in a fusillade of bullets that ripped and shredded everything inside the terminal.
Though he couldn’t understand the words, Price could tell the shouts from the Chinese soldiers were panicked. The PLA did their best to return fire and counter the ambush they’d walked into, hurling a few grenades toward the Americans.
Bam, BAM!
Sergeant Price grabbed one of the M67 fragmentation grenades from his pouch, pulled the pin, and lobbed it at a cluster of enemy soldiers that had taken cover behind one of the kiosk counters. The grenade exploded with a dull thud and a cloud of smoke, silencing the enemy attackers.
Just as the fire from the PLA soldiers was dying down, the north side of the building erupted in shards of wood, metal and glass. Green tracers tore through the walls of the building and anything they happened to hit. The three enemy vehicles outside had turned their 12.7mm machine guns on the terminal, lighting the entire building up. Price knew they couldn’t stay in the building much longer if those machine guns were going to continue to rake the structure with their heavy-caliber slugs — they’d tear the whole place apart.
Price looked around for one of his squad leaders and spotted one of the newer soldiers in their unit unslinging the AT4 he had with him. The young man ran toward one of the windows on the north side of the building. When there was a break in enemy fire near him, he jumped up, aimed the AT4 through the window, and fired.
Sergeant Price heard the usual small popping noise and a sudden swoosh of flame as the rocket flew out of the weapon. It landed squarely against the side of the enemy vehicle, thoroughly decimating it. The young Ranger ducked for cover and sprinted back deeper into the building, but the wall where he had just been standing was swiftly torn apart. A heavy-caliber round hit the soldier in the leg, completely ripping it off. Just as the soldier was about to tumble forward from his own momentum, a second round hit him in the back, nearly cutting the man in half. His body landed with a thud, motionless and suddenly devoid of life.
Before any of them could say or do anything else, two loud explosions outside rattled the entire building, blowing out any remaining glass. Shrapnel pelted the north side of the building. The enemy fire suddenly ceased, and an eerie calm took its place. Cries from the wounded suddenly broke the silence, as both friendly and enemy soldiers called out for medical aid.
“Secure the building!” shouted Price.
He ran to one of the blown-out windows to see what had happened. When he got there, he saw that the last two enemy vehicles had been blown up by something — maybe an Allied plane or drone overhead. In either case, it had saved their butts from certain death.
A few minutes later, the other two squads of the platoon arrived at the station, along with their captain. The next hour was spent securing the railyard, making sure no other enemy soldiers were nearby and then inspecting the tracks for any attempts at sabotage.
It took the Rangers nearly two hours to secure the city, but they had captured the critical railyard, highways and remaining critical infrastructure needed for the main army to arrive on trains. A battalion of Stryker vehicles and a company of main battle tanks arrived, relieving them and taking over security of the city while the rest of the Army group was trucked in by rail and heavy transports.
Over the next several weeks, Army Group One began the process of consolidating its forces in Inner Mongolia and preparing for their backdoor march on Beijing.
Chapter 8
Project Enigma
The tension in the room was so thick, it felt like it could literally be cut with a knife. General John Bennet and General Roy Cutter exchanged a nervous look as the President’s Chief Cyberwarfare Advisor, Katelyn Mackie, finished briefing them and General Cutter’s division commanders on the “eyes only” program named Project Enigma. Months of planning for the invasion of mainland China had just changed in the blink of an eye.
General Bennet was the first to speak. “Ms. Mackie, the Pentagon, NSA, DIA and CIA are one hundred percent certain that these new UAVs are being built out of the Guangdong Province? We’re about to start our ground invasion of the area shortly. I’ve already scrapped our old invasion plans to secure this province as ordered by the SecDef — I want to make sure there are no more major changes to our invasion plans.”
The other generals stared at her in silence, waiting to hear her response.
“Yes, General Bennet. Our source within the program has verified it,” she confirmed. “He’s been a reliable source and very accurate. There are a series of manufacturing plants in and around the Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport. The UAVs are being built in the general area of the international airport and over in Shayao District, maybe ten kilometers to the east of it. The capture of this province, General, will in all likelihood knock the Chinese out of the war. It’s their industrial heartland and where most of their aerospace industry is located.”
“Do we have a firm timeframe on when our satellites are going to go down yet?” asked one of the other generals.
“I’m afraid we don’t know the exact date, only that they will, and soon. In anticipation, we’re moving forward with deploying as many of our UAVs and contingency equipment as possible.”
One of the G6 officers from the group responsible for the ground forces communications systems added, “Fortunately, the Pentagon has kept a large stockpile of older yet still effective communication systems. The older systems may not be able to handle as much data volume, but they will still allow our forces to communicate, coordinate and relay information. I spoke with my counterpart back at the Pentagon, and they’re moving a lot more UAVs to our location from Europe. Losing the satellites is going to hurt, but it won’t cripple us like it might have two or three years ago, before we figured out a workaround for all the Russian and Chinese jamming and cyberattacks that happened at the beginning of the war.”
A few of the other generals nodded. Unlike the Iraqis and Afghanis, the Russians and Chinese had proven themselves to be fairly adept at electronic jamming. However, when the US’s military satellites had started to get blown up at the beginning of the war, the American military had quickly switched over to their backup radio systems, so the solution had been proven to work at least once already, even if it wasn’t an entirely effective patch to the problem.
The Marine Commander, General Cutter, gruffly added, “My concern is with being able to call in for accurate airstrikes. We need effective communications when the fighting starts hot and heavy. So many of our current systems are digital, transmitting large quantities of data, and I’m worried our older systems may not be as capable of handling the load that’s going to be placed on them.”