As they approached the outer part of the port, they saw a couple of buildings near the wharf and headed toward them. When they reached the building, several dozen Marines dismounted from the vehicles and began to clear the surrounding structures.
A few moments passed before Long got out of his command vehicle, and one of the sergeants walked up to him. “We’ve cleared the buildings, if you want to use them, Sir. They look to be warehouses for something.”
“Good job, Sergeant. Yes, let’s make this building the battalion HQ and the aid station. See if we can’t get some machine guns set up on the roofs to act as lookouts and keep any enemy forces at bay. I want the LAVs to help create a perimeter as well,” he directed.
His devil dogs went to work on transforming the terminal into a forward command center. While his Marines carried some of their equipment and radios into their newly acquired building, the rest of Sierra Company started to arrive. The mortar platoon went to work getting their tubes set up, ready to deliver fire missions. The medical section prepared their aid section, and two landing zones were quickly identified and prepped for use by medevacs.
Once they had their new HQ prepped, Long sent word out to regiment that his battalion had secured their objectives and were holding in place. He also let the other companies know they had the aid station up and running, so if they needed to start ferrying some of their wounded over they could.
In the distance, he heard the sound of rotor blades thumping. He stepped outside the new HQ and saw a pair of Cobra attack helicopters fly overhead on their way to support one of his companies. The Cobras were quickly followed by two Ospreys that had spotted them and headed toward their newly established LZ.
Once the helicopters landed, a platoon of fresh Marines trotted off, and a small group of men and women that he figured must be officers headed in Lieutenant Long’s direction. Some of the corpsmen and their lone field surgeon rushed a couple of wounded Marines to the helicopters before they could take off.
“No sense in letting a perfectly good ride back to the fleet leave without evacuating our wounded,” Long thought with a smile.
Brigadier General Tillman approached him. “Lieutenant Colonel Long, hell of a job securing these ports!” he shouted over the rotor wash and the distant sounds of battle.
Long gestured for them to head into the warehouse, where several of the newly arrived Marines worked on unloading a couple of pelican cases of radios and other gear they had brought with them. Once they were inside the building, Long turned to his mentor.
“Sir, we’re still securing the area,” he explained, concern in his voice. “My guys only got here thirty minutes ago. It’s not safe to have you this far forward.” Long had really taken a liking to General Tillman since he’d promoted him to captain. Working on his staff for five months prior to taking command of 4/6 Marines had taught him a lot about the man as a commander and a leader, and he respected him greatly.
Waving off the concern, Tillman replied, “Nonsense. I need to see what’s going on up here at the front. Besides, I’ve brought another platoon of Marines with me. Once I get a sense of where the front is, I’m going to order 8th Marine Regiment in. I still have them sitting offshore, begging to be unleashed.” He grinned. “Bring me up to speed, Long.”
They walked over to a map board one of the sergeants had just set up. Perusing the map briefly, Long reviewed the locations of his Marines as well as the designations that showed which of his groups were currently engaged and which weren’t seeing any action. “Right now, most of the heavy fighting is happening over in Sector Five, two kilometers north of where we are.” While he spoke, they overheard several thumping noises. The mortar platoon must have started a fire mission.
General Tillman in approval. “OK, then that’s where I’m going to unleash the 8th Marines. We’ve got to do our best to push the PLA out of the center of the city and secure a wide perimeter. I’ve got 2nd Tank Battalion on two Ro-Ro ships, navigating their way to the port right now. We need to get those tanks and other armored vehicles and equipment unloaded.”
“We also need ammunition bad, Sir,” Long insisted. “We’re almost black on all types of ammo right now. We got one resupply before we fought our way through the city, but we burned through a lot of it securing these ports.”
“Copy that. We’ll start work on that now,” Tillman replied. He turned to one of his officers, who swiftly walked over to the bank of radios one of the sergeants had just finished setting up.
The remainder of the day was a complete slugfest throughout the city once the 8th Marines and the 2nd Tank Battalion got ashore. The Chinese had moved several brigades of PLA militia forces into the city to try and slow the Marines’ efforts to secure the city. During the second and third day of the invasion, the fighting largely devolved into house-to-house, block-by-block combat. Large swaths of the city were torn apart by the conflict. Millions of residents fled to the countryside, desperate to get away from the warring factions.
Chapter 12
Where’s My Internet?
“They’re nearly done, Kate,” Tyler Walden said as they observed the Chinese blotting the last few satellites from orbit. What satellites they couldn’t destroy with their ground-based lasers, they’d used missile interceptors on. In the span of twelve hours, they had destroyed all but a handful of satellites.
Katelyn Mackie snorted. “I’m surprised they’ve waited this long,” she retorted. “Our source said soon, and here we are nearly three months later, and they’re just now finally doing it.” She shook her head. It was hard to explain, but she was almost angry that the Chinese had waited until today to start taking out the world’s satellite infrastructure, especially given their plan.
Mackie turned to look at one of the other analysts. “Are we up and running on their systems yet?” she asked.
“We sure are, Ms. Mackie. We’re seeing everything they’re transmitting, just like we thought we would.”
A devilish smile spread across her face. “Now the tide of the war will swing in our direction,” she said confidently.
Tyler was almost giddy with excitement at what they were seeing. His team had spent many weeks working on the code that would allow them to mirror the PLA’s entire message traffic. “It’s really working, Kate. We’re really doing it.”
“Let’s just hope the people upstairs are able to capitalize on the treasure trove of information we’re providing them,” she said. “I heard they hired two hundred new linguists over the last six months in preparation for this moment.”
The two architects of the Allies’ modern-day Ultra system couldn’t have been happier with their work than they were at that moment, seeing it fully operational for the first time. Soon, a continuous flow of intelligence would be making its way to the ground forces currently fighting inside China. They firmly believed this was the single strategy that would end the war much sooner than it would otherwise.
It was nearly 2000 hours when the President walked into the PEOC with his Chief of Staff, Josh Morgan, at his side. The various military leaders and advisors stood when the President entered.
“OK, gentlemen bring me up to speed,” he said dejectedly as he took his seat. “Have the Chinese finished taking the world’s satellites out?” he asked. He signaled for the others to take their seats as well.