A sharp clanging deafened the two women as machine-gun fire raked their right side. The Toga armor the Israelis had covered the APC with had done its job and they were okay. The lightweight carbon sheets could stop a 14.5-millimeter shell before it hit the main hull. “Where’s it coming from?” Hanni shouted, concentrating on driving and working her way across and down the slope toward the TOW team. Shoshana spun her periscope around until she found the machine gun. An Iraqi BMP on their right was racing them to the TOW team. The BMP had taken a hit on its turret disabling the 73- millimeter smooth-bore gun, but one of the troops inside was firing out of a gunport on the side, trying to take out the APC. Now Hanni could see the BMP.
“Don’t they see our red cross?” Hanni shouted. A heavier burst of machine-gun fire beat against the Toga armor, across the freshly painted red cross.
The two vehicles were on a collision course and would collide at the spot where the wounded Israelis were dug in. Another gunport on the BMP swung open and Shoshana saw the snout of an RPG aim at them. Their Toga armor and 30- millimeter thick aluminum hull could not stop the Soviet-made rocket-propelled grenade. “Hard right!” Shoshana yelled. Hanni slued the APC to the right, directly toward the BMP just as the RPG fired. The rocket-propelled projectile flashed past behind them. “Ram the son of a bitch!” Shoshana screamed.
Hanni gunned the engine and roared down the hill, gaining momentum, headed directly for the BMP. Shoshana dropped to the floor and braced her back against the forward bulkhead. Gravity, inertia, and the slope of the hill worked in their favor as Hanni smashed the raked, heavily armored nose of their M113 into the left side of the BMP. The BMP lifted, slowly turned over onto its right side, and skidded down the hill. For a moment, neither woman moved, too stunned and bruised by the impact to react. Then Hanni restarted the engine and mashed the accelerator, ramming the bottom side of the BMP and turning it completely over. She backed away as flames licked out from underneath the BMP. They headed for the wounded Israelis.
Shoshana dropped the ramp when Hanni halted the APCand jumped into the shallow ravine where the TOW team had hidden their Hummer. They had taken a hit from a single mortar round and only one man was left alive. She tried to pull his clothes away from the wound to stop the bleeding but her NBC gloves were too bulky. Then the eyepieces on her mask started to fog. Out of frustration, she ripped off the mask and heavy outer gloves, still wearing thin rubber surgical gloves. Unencumbered, she quickly stuffed a compress bandage into the gaping wound on the man’s left side. Luckily his Kevlar flak jacket had taken most of the shrapnel from the mortar round. Hanni was beside her and the two women dragged the man out of the ravine and into the crew compartment of the APC where Shoshana could properly bandage him. Hanni headed for their next pickup.
After they had picked up six wounded, they headed back up the slope toward an aid station. The radio directed them to the rear area where the brigade was waiting for the order to counterattack. As they crested the top of the ridge, Shoshana stuck her head out the top hatch and looked back into the valley. Two kilometers away, she could see Israeli tanks coming down the western slope and cutting into the right flank of the second echelon of Iraqi tanks. They headed to the rear with their fragile cargo.
“Where is everybody?” Shoshana said to one of the medics who met them at the aid station in the brigade’s holding area.
The woman gave her a frightened look. “They pulled out the rest of the brigade to reinforce the Golan. We’ve made a major breakthrough and want to push the Syrians back.”
“My God, we’re here all alone,” Shoshana said. “Does Levy know?”
“He knows,” the medic answered. “Go over there.” She pointed to a decon area. “Scrub your APC down and change your suits. The nerve gas wasn’t as effective as we thought. It’s all gone.”
Twenty minutes later, they were back at their original jumpoff point. Two men and a woman were standing behind Levy’s tank in the comparative safety of his hide, talking to him. All four had their gas masks off and NBC suits open, trying to cool off. Shoshana joined them and listened as the outgoing sounds of artillery punctuated the conversation. At leastwe’ve still got some support, she thought. Then what Levy was saying hit her — the Iraqis were pulling back.
Slowly, the pieces of the action filled in. They had stopped the Iraqi advance just as the order pulling the rest of the brigade out to reinforce the Golan Heights had come down. Then the two companies had counterattacked on the Iraqis’ right flank to cut through the second echelon. But there it had all come apart and the Israeli tanks had taken heavy losses before they could cross through and regroup. Their counterattack had ground to a halt and only the withdrawal of the Iraqis had saved them. Levy’s Luck, Shoshana decided.
“Casualties?” Levy asked. Shoshana was horrified as the tally mounted. The two men and woman with Levy were platoon commanders; their company commander had been killed. The exact status of the other two companies down in the valley was unknown. “Shoshana,” Levy said, looking at her and then glancing down into the valley. She nodded and knew where she was needed.
The carnage among the tanks was the heaviest either of the women had ever seen. Two other Israeli APCs were picking up the wounded as medics worked furiously to save whom they could. A wave of a hand guided them to the eastern side of the valley where they could see numerous burning tanks and APCs. The first four tanks they came to were Iraqi. “Where are the Iraqi medics?” Hanni asked in frustration. Shoshana didn’t have an answer but suspected the Iraqi high command was relying on the Israelis to take care of all the wounded.
The position of the destroyed tanks told the story. Three Israeli tanks supported by two APCs had taken on an Iraqi company of twelve tanks and twelve BMPs. The two women moved among the bodies, looking for the living. Shoshana found the lieutenant who had argued with Levy only to fall under his spell. His body was badly charred but he was still alive and conscious. She knew the man was near death and stopped to administer a heavy shot of morphine. It was all she could do.
The lieutenant looked at her. “Tell Levy,” he whispered, “we never had a chance to regroup. But I didn’t run.”
“I will.” Shoshana stood and moved on. The lieutenant understood.
The staff officer on night duty was standing in the communications room in the basement of the White House sorting the early-morning message traffic when the telephone call from the Washington, D.C., police came through. He took the call and listened, trying to mask his emotions. He knew that he should be serious, concerned, and properly subdued by the news. But why was he feeling so good? He broke the connection and punched a number on the telepanel. “I had better tell the President immediately,” he said to the communications clerk.
“Without going through Fraser?” the shocked clerk blurted.
“I don’t think Mr. Fraser is in a position to do anything about it,” the staff officer said, giving up any attempt at burying his grin.
Pontowski listened to the report of Fraser’s death and thanked the young staff officer. He returned the telephone to its cradle beside his wife’s bed and pulled off his reading glasses. Although his wife was seriously ill, she was fully rational and the doctors were confident that her latest bout with lupus had stabilized and that she might improve. He knew it helped her spirits when he confided in her, a sure signal from him that she was on the mend. “Tom Fraser was just found dead in his apartment,” he told her. “Heart attack.”