Wiping the remnants from his mouth, he keyed the mike.
“Driver, move left. Wall and tree. Put us in behind the wall a-sap. Gunner, target, left twelve, range twelve hundred.”
Dewey moved the long-barrelled 90mm into the right line, adjusting as the tank moved into its firing position.
The movement stopped and he waited for the rocking of the suspension to stop.
“Target tank, on.”
“FIRE!”
The breech flew back into the turret as the powerful gun sent its deadly missile down range.
Dewey never celebrated his kills for reasons best known to him, but Parker’s whoop let the tank crew know that their shell had gone home to good effect.
In fact, Dewey was something of a mystery to the rest of the crew, bar Parker, who had the advantage of having read the man’s file.
He suspected he knew the reasons behind the gunner’s aloofness, but had never tackled him on the subject of what had actually happened at Arracourt in September ’44, and the story behind the Silver Star and Purple Heart Dewey had been awarded.
He never wore the ribbons and evaded any questions when asked about his family, life, or history, save to confirm he had seen combat with the 4th Armored before arriving with the 15th.
All Nathaniel Parker really needed to know about the man was his gunnery skills, and Dewey was as proficient as they came.
“Target, tank, right two, range thirteen hundred.”
“On.”
“FIRE!”
Another armor-piercing, composite rigid tank-killing shell went from muzzle to target in the blink of an eye.
The old Model44 T34 disintegrated under the hammer blow.
“Driver, move right and forward, hedge line.”
The Super Pershing clipped the stonewall as it moved, destroying the corner in an instant.
Parker instinctively dropped himself into the turret as a flurry of mortar shells arrived, adding to the destruction of the old wall and its surroundings.
He smiled to himself and raised his head enough to sweep the enemy positions with his binoculars.
There was…
He concentrated.
‘Well I’ll be…’
Parker saw something important.
Allowing the tank to find its cover, he whispered into the mike.
“Command tank, right three, range fourteen hundred, Chinese fucking laundry…see him?”
The gun swung gently.
“Nope… ah… yep… fucking sneaky bastard!”
The tell-tale aerials of a command tank were tied down and the T34 was camouflaged by the simple but effective use of washing draped around it.
Dewey made a small adjustment.
“On.”
“Fire.”
The Soviet tank company lost its commanding officer.
230th ‘Zhitomir’ Independent Tank Regiment had lost more than a company commander to the lethal 90mm’s of the Super Pershings, its first company T34s mostly burning and smoking in the valley where they had first sprung a surprise on the Battle-axe infantrymen.
The Zhitomir Regiment was not at full strength, but had received reinforcements from units broken up by casualties, and touted an impressive order of battle for a Soviet armoured unit at this stage in the war.
Major Yatzhin, a veteran of Kursk, Bagration, and the final days in Czechoslovakia, commanded a mixed force of T34s, as well as an infantry company and the remnants of a heavy tank unit, whose IS-IIIs now lay in wait for the US advance.
The Cossack General commanding had sent more cavalrymen from the 6th Guards Cavalry Corps to help with the defence of Heights 434 and 493.
The tank Major ensured his own defences on 493 were fully prepared, and ordered the newly arrived horseless cavalrymen to thicken up his defence, and retained his own SMG unit as a reaction force to seal any breach.
Yatzhin’s command tank was dug-in on the slope of Height 493, from where he observed the slow but sure advance of the American heavy tanks.
Puzzled that the artillery had slackened off, Yatzhin contacted the Artillery liaison officer, only to discover that the artillery battalion had been attacked by aircraft and was repositioning…
…what was left of it…
He still had a company of Katyusha up his sleeve, but their value against heavy tanks was limited.
The American juggernaut crept closer.
“Gunner, follow the lead one on the road there. Stay on target.”
He flicked the radio switch to his unit’s frequency and thumbed the mike.
“Kukhnya-Zero, all units Podval, Uchitel-Zero, Kukhnya-Two and Kukhnya-Three, hold your fire… hold your fire…”
He released the mike button and spared a milli-second’s thought for the commander and men of Kukhnya-One, whose men and machines lay blasted in the valley to his right.
The moment passed and he returned to his mental picture of the battlefield, imagining his tanks, and those of the broken heavy tank regiment, the handful of anti-tank guns, and the infantry… and the mines.
“…Hold your fire…”
The mines had been provided from stocks liberated from the former Nazi army, Type 43 Riegel bar mines in large numbers, notorious for their sensitivity and instability due to corrosion in the wiring, a fact attested to by the engineer unit that had laid them, which had lost three valuable men in the process.
The mines were another reason that his artillery had avoided the valley floor, not wishing to set off the sensitive devices before they had a chance to play their part.
“…Hold your fire…”
The large enemy tanks were still progressing, seeking new targets to their front, occasionally halting to fire and pick off a survivor from his First Company.
“… Hold your fire…”
A shell sent from the side of Height 434 achieved success, struck the side of a Super Pershing’s turret and deflected perfectly into the hull armour.
The turret leapt skywards, driven up by the huge force of the explosion, killing the entire crew instantly.
Vengeance was swift, despite the best efforts of the T34 to move back to cover.
Three 90mm shells transformed it to scrap metal within seconds.
“…Hold your fire…”
The destruction of the T34 was a signal to the GIs of the 259th, and they rose up as their officers and NCOs screamed at them, pushing hard to get out of the valley and up the slopes to their target.
This surge encouraged Parker to push his men harder, and he urged his two platoons to move forward quicker.
“…Hold…”
Yatzhin held his breath, sensing the moment approaching.
Above the sounds of battle, the crack of exploding Riegel mines reached his ears. Shifting his binoculars, he quickly spotted an enemy tank, its tracks both shed, disabled, and bereft of cover.
To its left, another tank, one track gone, desperately tried to make some move to the nearest cover.
“Fire!”
More Riegels exploded before the first volley arrived, disabling a total of six of the heavy tanks.
Two of the disabled Super Pershings became kills as 100mm and 122mm shells arrived on target, although it was the 100mm missiles that did the damage, the 122mm HEAT shells being defeated by the spaced armour they struck.
More HEAT followed before the IS-III commanders realised their error and reverted to solid shot.
Even when disabled, the Super Pershings were a tough nut to crack, and soon Yatzhin’s casualties started to mount.
He reverted to tactics of old, used successfully against the waves of panzers at Kursk.
“Kukhnya-Zero, Kukhnya-Two, Kukhnya-three, advance immediately, close down the range, out.”
He took the acknowledgements before contacting the IS-III unit.