The latrines were placed over long drop latrine holes with lime liberally tossed in; the idea being that the holes would be filled in and the latrines moved to new sites as necessary. Alcohol gel dispensers were filled and fixed to the latrines — hygiene was imperative and it would not do to spread germs or disease.
For washing, just upstream of the latrine areas were separate male and female areas, privacy provided by a mix of plywood panels and cloth partitions attached to pickets to form enclosures. Within the two enclosures were tables and a supply of plastic washbowls. Hot water was available from the kitchen area most of the time and it could be collected in a bowl and taken to the wash area.
In each area was also a couple of camping shower tents with attachment hooks for hanging up the solar showers that were available. Failing summer, hot water could also be used to fill these solar shower bags. The latrine and washing areas were entirely covered by camo netting and there was a covered walkway down to the area from the kitchen site.
The accommodation bunkers were shored up with timber, it was like being in a mine passage, and there were rough plywood partitions inside that divided up family areas with cot beds, a table and a few chairs. There were lockers and shelves for the stowing of personal gear.
There was not a great deal of privacy; Jack could see where other families had done a bit of rough carpentry or hung blankets to help with this. It was obvious that there were some generators in the base and there were some electrical cables with lights strung throughout the dugouts, but they were not running now. Fuel was obviously a concern and would be rationed. There was a mix of candles and propane lamps dotted around to provide light.
The Berengers were allocated an area and started to move their gear into it.
Jack found Major Cassidy over in the operations center bunker at his desk. They shook hands and Major Cassidy gestured to Jack to take a seat across the desk from him.
“So Captain Berenger, it’s good to have you on board,” he said. “We need to get the training operation going so we can hit back. I have a core of veterans organized into two squads that we should be able to put into action soon.”
“Roger that Sir,” said Jack, alarm bells going off. “It’s been a while since I was called Captain,” he said with a smile.
“Yes well, it’s important that we maintain standards and discipline,” retorted Major Cassidy.
Jack agreed that this was so, but he could not help feeling that Major Cassidy was standing on ceremony a little too much. Cassidy went on to describe the defensive situation at the base, and let Jack know that he would take him and Jim around later on a tour of the positions. It was apparent that they had enough fighters to maintain a basic defense of the base, while training the Company to conduct insurgency operations.
There were three defensive positions; the first was the two bunkers they had passed on the way in, there were two more bunkers where the trail continued on the other side of the draw, and also a listening/observation post above the camp up on the ridge above.
There were enough fighters allocated to Zulu to rotate through these positions and keep them permanently manned, but no more, and as yet there were limited personnel available for clearance patrols. The burden of manning three defensive positions around the base was manpower intensive.
They discussed the idea of operating an area defense, but it was manpower prohibitive at this point. An area defense would involve not simply manning the sentry positions surrounding the base, but conducting a reactive defense based on detecting the location, direction and size of approaching enemy threats. This would come down to establishing observation posts, OPs, pushed out to observe possible enemy routes in to the base.
There were primarily three routes in — the trail running through the base on both the north and south sides, and also from the ridge above following the draw downwards to Zulu.
To mount an area defense, each route would require a prepared defensive or ambush location that would be manned following triggering by the outlying OP positions. This would make it a combination of an area and a mobile defense. It was certainly true that in this situation ‘he who defended everywhere defended nowhere.’
But such a plan would have to wait on manpower.
Major Cassidy read the letter from Bill and seemed happy enough with establishing the training base over the ridge at the farm, about five miles away to the south east. He wasn’t going to interfere too much with Jack’s training plans.
The fighters that would remain at Zulu manning the static defensive positions were mainly the older, injured, or less experienced ‘home guard’, while the younger, fitter, more experienced or recent veteran types would be moved out to the training base.
The plan was that any further recruits, unless they were coming with families, would not be moved through Camp Zulu, but directly to the training base from the other side of the ridge, in order to maintain OPSEC. The fighters with families at Zulu could be relied upon to keep their mouths shut about the location, and would be briefed on the importance of this.
They would establish a light trail through the trees to link the two bases, running it into the main trail where it met the sentry bunkers on the south side of the base.
Major Cassidy was the operational commander for the Resistance region, or at least he was within the organization that Bill had created. It meant that he called the shots. He explained to Jack that in the light of Bill’s letter he planned to run operations initially from Victor Foxtrot. He was going to hand off the administration and running of Zulu to Paul Granger. He was keen to get operations running, though Jack got the feeling that he was perhaps not too keen to be directly involved himself.
Jack was increasingly getting the feeling that although Cassidy was a professional and well educated former officer, he tended to stand on doctrine and ceremony and was perhaps a little too conventional in his outlook for Jacks liking. He did however make headway with him over training and the model for the Company. Jack wasn’t going out on operations anyway, so his job was to best prepare the fighters and hand them back to Major Cassidy ready to go.
They did discuss the logistical requirements for the new training base. It was now October and they were heading into a winter in the mountains. Weapons and equipment had been procured and cached and would be moved to the new training site, as well as an administrator and staff to keep the place running around the training requirements.
They had plenty of weapons, ammunition, equipment and items such as body armor available. It had either been brought in by the fighters themselves, many who were deserting veterans, captured or profiteered on the back of the looting, or ‘procured’ via bureaucratic corruption.
Cassidy explained the he would make available a truckload of military body armor and various pouches and ancillaries that had been diverted from its destination. It was all in the UCP, or universal camouflage pattern, used in the army ACU uniforms, but they had also acquired plenty of camo spray paint in flat camouflage tones to spray it up and make it unrecognizable.
They agreed that Jack and Jim would move up to Victor Foxtrot in a week once the stores had been moved into place, in order to get the training in motion.
The next week for Jack was divided between his family and planning. He was helping to settle Caitlin and the kids into their new home in the bunker while also making logistical arrangements with Jim to get Victor Foxtrot up and running.