The Behemoth was a three hundred ton monstrosity. The first twenty experimental tanks had gone a long way toward defeating the Chinese thrust into California beginning this April. Well, maybe not defeating, but blunting it enough so the attack had finally ground to a halt.
The Californian War had cost the Behemoth Regiment too many of its tanks, but they’d gotten the job accomplished. One by one, the battered survivors had left Southern California as cargo haulers laboriously transported them back to Denver.
Stan wore a thick coat and gloves. The gloves were old, with a piece of duct tape wrapped around his left index finger. It was so cold in the plant he could see his breath. He watched as technicians and engineers worked around the latest tank. Heaters billowing hot wavy air surrounded the workers and the half-finished Behemoth, which didn’t even have its cannon yet. A rattling chain hoist with a hook moved along its track on the high ceiling, bringing another heavy component to the vehicle.
The Behemoth was an experimental tank that used a force cannon, or rail-gun, to fire its projectiles. Before April and the war in California no one had known if the U.S. government was going to build many more of them. This lone plant built the tanks one at a time, handcrafted them so to speak. There was nothing assembly line about this.
Stan shook his head. He was in his fifties, an aging athlete. He was still five ten, but weighed almost two hundred pounds. That was fifteen pounds too heavy, in his opinion. When he could, he lifted weights and shot a few hoops with his men in a local high school gym, but his passion was Ping-Pong, and no one in the regiment could beat him. Now that he was a colonel, did some of the younger troops pull their shots? He sure hoped not.
Stan dyed his hair to its original blondish-brown color, although he’d be damned if he’d ever let anyone know. He had too many aches and pains in his joints and he had a bum knee. If he quit lifting and playing basketball, his minor injuries might heal up, but then he would probably turn flabby. His greatest physical dread was becoming old, fat and weak.
Too bad those weren’t his only worries.
His boy Jake was missing. The authorities had shipped his college-aged son straight from the Detention Center, where he’d served time for protesting President Sims, to a Militia battalion. The Chinese had gobbled up the battalion in Texas during the summer battles where they’d also devoured entire American Army corps. Was Jake dead, in a Chinese POW camp or had he become one of the thousands of American soldiers who had joined the Resistance behind enemy lines? Maybe because of the unknowing, Stan’s wife had retreated even deeper into her soaps. It was all she did: sit in front of the TV and watch make-believe because life had become too horrible for her.
No, Stan didn’t want to think about Jake or the screw-ups who had sent an untrained youth into battle. If he did think about it, he would become by turn too sad or angry, and he couldn’t afford either emotion now.
Focus, old man. Try to pay attention while you’re here. You might learn something new.
The plant manager—a gangling man with a billy-goat beard—stood beside him, rambling on about the newest additions to the latest Behemoth.
Stan would have liked to tell the man that was the wrong way to build a war-winner. The Germans during World War II had dicked with their many variations of tanks. Instead of picking one decent design and sticking with it—and mass-producing it—they had frittered away numbers by trying to find the perfect vehicle. The Russians on the other hand had mass produced T-34s and done just fine.
It would impress me better if this plant could produce more than one tank every four weeks.
Several months ago President Sims had thrown the regiment’s twenty tanks into the cauldron of California’s spring battles. Thirteen battered semi-wrecks had made it out. Since May, the workers here had been refitting the monsters, bringing them back to battle-worthiness. In that time, they’d also added four new tanks. That meant, as of this moment in late October, the Behemoth Regiment consisted of seventeen tanks.
Seventeen tanks, no matter how good, could not pull a rabbit out of the hat this time. The situation and weather—and the soggy soil—absolutely prohibited it.
Stan turned up the fur-lined collar of his great coat. He nodded, hearing the plant manager, absorbing the data, but not really listening with his whole mind. He had other worries, other thoughts.
In Alaska and during the California fight, he’d been a captain. They had temporarily upgraded him to major in California, but it hadn’t stuck. Several weeks after the end of the fight, another promotion came: to colonel of the Behemoth Regiment. That promotion had been made permanent.
He had been in Denver for several months now. His main task had been reassembling the Behemoth Regiment and teaching the crews how to fight and defeat the enemy. He had been absorbing the information learned in California and thinking hard about it.
For that task, he was perfect. In Alaska seven years ago, he’d been a high school history teacher. In the Alaskan National Guard, they had called him “the Professor.” The high school students did the same thing. He knew his history. Even better, he knew his military history and military theory.
They say what goes around comes around. Solomon had once written that there was nothing new under the sun, and Stan believed it. He had thought deeply about the Behemoth tanks. He’d also studied the enemy and the American Armed Forces.
The plant manager pointed at the latest tank.
Stan nodded politely.
He’d worked under General Larson before in California. Larson presently commanded the defense in Denver. The general’s talents in Los Angeles had impressed the Joint Chiefs and possibly the President, which is why they’d put Larson in this hot spot. Denver had to hold. The Joint Chiefs meant to stop the great advance here.
To that end, Stan had spent many long evenings discussing the operational and tactical situation with General Larson. The man had listened to Stan, and the general had incorporated some of his ideas, using them to keep the Chinese away from the city.
The reason Stan was nervous and only paying half-attention to the plant manager was that General Tom McGraw was arriving in Denver tomorrow. Many, many years ago, Stan had gone to Officer Candidate School with McGraw. They had hung out together then and found they both had an interest in ancient history.
Big Tom McGraw…the Joint Chiefs, well, President Sims, had promoted the hard-charging soldier several times already these past few months.
This summer, McGraw had saved his troops in surrounded Dallas. He’d broken out of the Chinese lines and reunited with the main American Army. He did it a second time, saving even more men and equipment from the Canadian River Pocket. Because of that, the President had bumped McGraw in authority yet again. No, it was more like President Sims had rocketed the man to prominence. Tom McGraw had taken over Army Group West. The formations in Denver belonged to that Army Group.
Tomorrow, Stan was sure Tom would demand the Behemoths rumble into battle and push the Chinese far away from their approach position to the Greater Denver area. That was bad because the ground right now was far too wet, far too soggy for the three hundred ton tanks. The U.S. Army needed to use the Behemoths properly or they would prove ineffectual. Could he convince Tom to wait until the ground froze hard?
He had his doubts. Hard-charging Tom McGraw didn’t like to listen to anyone—at least the young man he’d known in OCS hadn’t. McGraw was smart and he’d always been arrogant.
How can I convince him to listen to my advice? Stan wondered. If used right, the Behemoths will do wonders. But if used wrongly, they will be so much scrap metal, and that would be a shame.