“Warn the other garrisons to deploy with antitank weapons,” I ordered, tightly. The garrisons had had the same advantages as Fort Galloway, but they would be just as helpless against the self-propelled guns as Ed had been. “I want them to slow up the enemy as much as possible.”
“They have ninety tanks, all apparently late-model Landsharks, and over a hundred transports and supply trucks,” TechnoMage said, though my earpiece. “They all appear to be in quite good condition, but they don’t seem to have the experience that we have — at least, not yet.”
“We’re going to need that advantage,” I said, grimly. Our own armoured units were still being deployed north of New Copenhagen. The enemy was in a race to get there first — who gets there first with the most usually wins — and they didn’t have to worry about insurgents. They didn’t have to worry about bridges, either; there were no convenient bridges we could knock down to slow their advance. We’d war-gamed the entire scenario quite thoroughly back when we’d arrived and the best we’d done was hold the enemy at the gates of the city. “Contact the pilots of the UAV craft; I want them to concentrate on hitting the enemy supply trucks and slowing the bastards down, whatever it takes.”
“Understood,” TechnoMage said. “I’ll issue the orders at once.”
“Get me the Acting President,” I ordered, and went into my office. I had to talk to Frida. There were decisions to make that only she could make. “Frida; I’m afraid there is some bad news.”
Captain Jörgen Hellqvist and his men, after months of manning Garrison Nine and patrolling the surrounding area, knew it at least as well as the farmers who came out to attack the garrison from time to time. As soon as they drove the insurgents away, Jörgen pushed out patrols from his two Companies as far as he dared, forcing the insurgents to remain well clear of his position. A single isolated farmhouse, used by a handful of insurgents for a last stand, was burned to the ground, but other contacts just faded away. When the warning came in about incoming tanks, Jörgen deployed his men and prepared to meet them.
“Don’t fire until I open fire myself,” he said. The miners were following a fairly predictable path as they raced down towards the city, barely bothering with outriders or infantry support. Jörgen had actually trained on armour briefly while he’d been preparing to become a Captain and knew some of their weaknesses. The enemy could have driven cross-country, but that would have wrecked the fields and seriously annoyed the farmers. “Mark your tanks and get ready.”
The roar of the enemy vehicles drew closer and he braced himself for action. If the tankers knew — or guessed — that his men were there, they would open fire and the ditches and trees would provide absolutely no cover at all. They should have deployed infantry to flush out any watching soldiers, but they were concentrating on the race to the city instead. Jörgen kept reminding himself of that; they might not be able to stop the tanks, but they could certainly slow them down enough to buy time for the defenders of the city to get ready.
“Take aim,” he whispered. They were already within engagement range, but he wanted to make every shot count. “Take aim… and fire!”
He pulled the trigger on the UN-issue Knife missile and saw it lance out, propelled by a wave of flame, until it struck a tank directly on the vehicle’s forward armour. It was the best-protected part of the tank, but it didn’t matter to the knife missile, which produced a wave of superheated flame that burned through the armour and killed the crew inside. A moment later, the ammunition in the tank exploded and sent the entire vehicle up in a fireball. He dumped the remainder of the launcher on the ground — it couldn’t be used again — and ducked back into what pitiful shelter there was. Seven enemy tanks had been destroyed and two more had been damaged, but the remainder, now aware of the threat, opened fire savagely, slashing through trees and hedgerows to strike back at their tormentors.
Jörgen crawled, keeping as low as he could, away towards the fallback position as the enemy started to dismount their infantry, which ran into machine-gun fire from prepared positions. The tankers attempted to provide support to their fellows, only to reveal their lack of training and experience. Jörgen was able to escape along with most of his men, leaving the enemy behind licking their wounds.
“Get into the jeeps,” he muttered, as the enemy infantry started to patrol carefully after them. In their place, he would have withdrawn and kept advancing against New Copenhagen, although more carefully. If they wanted to waste time chasing his men that was fine with him; it just gave them a chance to set up another ambush further down the road. “We’ll meet up again at point seven.”
I watched Captain Jörgen Hellqvist’s encounter with the enemy as I spoke briefly to Frida. “The enemy force is going to be at New Copenhagen by late afternoon, at their current rate,” I said. It didn’t look as if Jörgen had delayed them enough to make them rethink their plans; indeed, it almost looked as if they had learned a few lessons and were pushing forward as fast as they could. “We might be able to stop it, but it will be chancy. You might want to think about moving your government somewhere else for a few days.”
“If they take New Copenhagen and wipe out most of the army in the fighting, they’re going to win anyway,” Frida said. She sounded tired and depressed, but at least she wasn’t on the verge of giving up. Whatever she thought, I knew that the Freedom League and their stooges had to be stopped, whatever it took. A government under their influence — a government that could not be proved to be under their influence — would be disastrous. They would have a base for further expansion and attacks on the Federation. “If that happens, I’ll be better staying here and trying to negotiate a peace if they punch through your defence line.”
“You won’t have many cards left to play,” I wanted. Russell, against his strong feelings, was moving up the cadets to serve as a mobile reserve. The enemy was largely untrained — indeed, looking at them, I had the feeling that they had learned most of their tactics from UN training manuals, generally a bad idea — but we only had a small cadre of experienced soldiers. “If we lose, the best you can do is offer to recognise their supremacy.”
“Then I will have to play that card,” Frida said. She laughed, suddenly. “Oh, come on, Andrew; the Progressive Party is on the verge of splitting apart and both sides are not happy with the thought of me as leader for the next few years, let alone the next election. Even if we win the war, I don’t think I’ll be Party Leader or President for much longer. Between your advice and the insurgency, I don’t have much political capital left at all. What do I have to lose?”
I smiled back at her. “I understand,” I said. I thought about ordering her guards to transfer her to one of the other cities, but she was right. If we lost the Battle of New Copenhagen, we’d have lost everything. The Legion’s first contract would also be its last. A real mercenary unit would probably start thinking of ways to switch sides now, or withdraw from the planet, but neither was an acceptable solution. The real mission had to succeed. “See you on the other side, then.”
Her face vanished from my display and I called up the latest results from the UAV overflights. The enemy were taking a beating, but they were remaining together — even though they were shooting up plenty of innocent hedgerows. Some of my units had been leaving IEDs and other surprises behind for them; Jock and the other Specials had managed to shoot one of their commanding officers from an impossible distance — or at least a distance that should have been impossible. Jock’s personal sniper rifle came from Heinlein and was vastly superior to anything from the UN. I hadn’t understood why until Russell had pointed it out. The UN put weapons design in the hands of a single committee, while Heinlein had hundreds of gun designers, each building on the achievements of their predecessors. The results should have been inevitable; Heinlein had enjoyed supremacy in weapons design until the UN fell apart and other planets started their own programs.