“Fall back!”
The exclamation was both a command to the other firing teams of his section and a statement of intent to his own waiting CO. He yanked the phone handset loose from the landline and scrambled for the passenger seat of his truck. His driver was already behind the wheel, kicking the engine over, as the gunner cast loose the last of the camouflage netting. There was a whispering rattle overhead. Eighty one millimeter rounds began to drop in the Red positions. As per the preset ambush scenario, the battalion mortarmen were laying a barrage of high explosives and white phosphorus in on the Communists. Hopefully, under the cover and confusion of the smoke, the antitank section would be able to successfully disengage.
False hope. A tank cannon slammed. The eastern most vehicle of the section flipped into the air like a shotgun-blasted beer can, the broken bodies of its driver and gunner spinning away to one side.
The command 4X4 lunged forward, crashing through the thin brush screen breaking line of sight with the enemy. A new sound was coming from the sky now the deeper wailing howl of heavy howitzer shells. The Nationalist division’s 155s were joining in the battle. As the surviving section vehicles bounced back through the gap in the minefield, proceeding to their battle stations in the battalion line of resistance, the young officer considered the engagement he had just lived through.
It had been a good exchange. One launcher for seven AFVs. That, plus the fact that they had broken the momenturn of the Red advance and had stalled them in place long enough for the artillery to tear them up a bit more. A very good exchange.
He could only hope that the families of the men he had just lost would see it that way.
Variants of this first engagement were being repeated scores of times over all across a twenty-mile front. Fifty five thousand Communist soldiers and eight thousand armored fighting vehicles were rising up out of the mud and hurling themselves headlong at the Nationalist beachhead defenses. Battle raged on all levels. On the ground, tanks intermixed in a clumsy dance of death, turning, spitting, and dying. Behind the hills and ridgelines, helicopter gunships stalked and sniped at ground targets In the middle altitudes, squadrons of jets slashed at each other, while in the stratosphere, artillery shells and rockets passed in flight, arcing along their ballistic paths to destruction.
One would almost have to go to the edge of space to find peace. And there, one would also find an observer.
Circling in a lazy racetrack pattern at 75,000 feet was one of the world’s oddest looking aircraft. Described as resembling “a clamshell glued in the middle of a yardstick,” the Darkstar reconnaissance drone bore no insignia beyond the distinctive sooty shading of its Ironball Gray stealth paint.
All but immune to ground-based detection, it rode the midnight-blue sky on its slender, straight wings, the systems in its observation bay systematically recording the holocaust below.
Six hundred miles to the east, over the East China Sea, the Darkstar’s command and control aircraft also orbited. A converted U.S. Air Force KC-10 tanker, it maintained a continuous DTI datalink with its distant robotic charge, exchanging flight and navigational instructions for a continuing real-time download from the drone’s sensors.
From there, the data was relayed through the KC 10’s commodious communications suite to half a dozen different destinations within the United States and the Pacific Rim. A great many people were interested in the outcome of this particular battle.
“All right, Major What’s going on out there?”
Sam Hanson and Lane Ashley sat in the darkness of the small Pentagon briefing room. The National Security Adviser and the NSA director were awaiting the latest word on the distant conflict.
Before them, the shadowy form of the duty briefing officer stood beside a computer-graphics map of the Chinese mainland.
“At the moment, sir, the core of the Communist offensive appears to be their Third Guards Tank Army. This is both the PLA’s best fire-brigade outfit and their largest available block of mobile reserves.”
The briefer indicated the key points on the map, his arm and pointing fingertip a black silhouette across the glowing wall screen.
“They are hitting the Nationalist beach head from the north and west, along three separate lines of advance. Here, from Fuzhou, from Nanping, and from Sha Xian, one divisional-strength column along each axis. The Communist objective is obvious. They are attempting to collapse and destroy the Nationalist beach head before the United Democratic Forces can launch their own offensive to break through to and link up with the Nationalists.”
“What are their chances of succeeding?” Director Ashley inquired.
“The Reds are going to get their asses blown away begging your pardon, ma’am.”
“You sound pretty sure about that, Major.”
“We are, ma’am,” the briefer replied. “What the Reds have been hoping for is to beat the UDFC to the punch, to destroy the Nationalists before the rebels are set to move. What they don’t realize is that they’ve already lost the race.”
“The United Democratic Forces are ready to go?”
“Yes, ma’am. If our intelligence estimates are correct, they’ve been set for several days. We believe that they’ve been waiting for the Communist attack.
“Now that the Communists have committed to their offensive, we believe that the UDFC will jump off down here, across the Shantau River line, probably within the next twenty four hours.”
Hanson nodded. “It makes sense, Lane. The Reds are going to be blindsided. Once they’ve committed to the attack on the Nationalist beach head, they won’t have the mobile assets available to react to the UDFC offensive.”
“What will happen to the Nationalists?”
“The Reds might be able to gain a few kilometers here and there, but they won’t be able to concentrate and follow through with their offensive. They’ll be caught in the worst of both worlds.”
“Yes, sir,” the briefer added “That will be about the shape of it. We are projecting that the Reds are going to lose the bulk of the Third Guards Tank Army. By this time next week, the Rebels should have broken through down at Shantall and will be driving north to link up with the Nationalists. With all of their theater reserves either burned up or committed, the Reds aren’t going to be able to stop them.”
The room lights came up and the briefing officer came to a parade rest beside the briefing screen, his Joint Chiefs of Staff identification badge glinting.
“We project that the PRC defenses are going to collapse and they are going to lose all of Fujian Province. They probably aren’t going to be able to restabilize the front again until somewhere up around the Wenzhou River line.”
“And then?” Lane Ashley asked.
“That’s still anybody’s guess, ma’am. The RAND conflict-simulation teams haven’t yet extended their projections beyond that point.”
“Then make it your own best educated guess, Major. In your opinion, how serious a setback will this be for the Communists?”
“Very serious, ma’am. This is a critical battle, a nexal point in the course of the war. Something like Gettysburg or Stalingrad. If the Reds lose this one, and the odds are they will, I can’t see how they’ll be able to recover.”
“I’ll buy into that assessment,” Sam Hanson added. “I think that we’re seeing the beginning of the end here.”
“I don’t like the sound of that phrase,” the NSA woman said grimly.
“Major, how about the Communist nuclear arsenal? Has there been any change of status reported?”
“We have no new information on that subject at this time, ma’am.”