“Okay,” Bannon muttered as he nodded, letting the S-3 know he was following what he was saying.
“Task Force 3rd of the 78th will pull out of the line on order, moving north, and spearhead the attack. Team Yankee will be in the lead.”
Once more Bannon’s mind wandered off the matter at hand. Several hours ago, somewhere in the division’s rear, while Team Yankee was still knee-deep in Russians the division’s commanding general had turned to his staff and pointed at a spot on the map. “Attack there.” While the first sergeant and Sergeant Folk had been dragging the bodies of Team Yankee’s dead to an out-of-the-way spot, the brigade commander had told the battalion commander, “Attack there.” Now the executor of the plan, the lead element commander, the lowest ranking person in the US Army to carry the coveted title of Commander, had his marching orders.
As he received the detailed instructions from the S-3 as to routes, objectives, fire support, and coordinating instructions, they were joined by the Team’s fire-support officer or FIST Team Chief, a 2nd Lt. Rodney Unger. He had finally made it back and was already familiar with the concept of the operation, so there was no need to go over anything with him. When the S-3 finished, he asked if there were any questions or anything that the Team needed. Bannon’s request that the Team be pulled out of the line now to an assembly area for a rest was denied. According to Reynolds, Team Bravo needed it more than Yankee did. As Team Bravo was going to be in reserve, Bannon next requested that the 1st Tank Platoon be returned. That request was also denied. He then requested that an ITV section be attached to the Team to make good their losses. That request too was denied as the other companies without tanks needed them more than Bannon’s team. Seeing that he wasn’t going to get anything from battalion but a pat on the back, a pep talk, and a boot up his ass, he stopped asking. With that, the meeting came to an end. The battalion commander and the S-3 left Team Yankee to go down to Charlie Company to calm them down before they chewed through their bit.
Uleski had the platoon leaders and the first sergeant assembled in the PC by the time the battalion commander left. They were exchanging information and observations as Bannon climbed into the track. Before he discussed the new mission, he had each platoon leader update him on the status of his platoon and the condition of the men and equipment.
All came across as tired, but confident. The first day’s success, it seemed, had removed many of the fears and doubts that they had had in themselves and in their men. The Team had met the Russians, laser range finder to laser range finder, and found that they could be beaten. Even Uleski came across as being more himself, which put Bannon in a far better mood. The negative thoughts that had kept clouding his mind while he had been in the battalion commander’s track were fading as the quiet, calm confidence of Team Yankee’s leadership gave its commander’s flagging morale a much needed boost.
According to the book, a leader is supposed to use one-third of the time he has available from when he receives a mission to when he executes it for the preparation of his order. That formula is a good guide, but it seldom works out in practice. Rather than keep his platoon leaders and FIST chief waiting while he came up with his plan, Bannon gave them what information he could. As the platoon leaders copied the graphics of the operation from Bannon’s map to theirs, he considered his plan of action and quickly wrote some notes for his initial briefing. This briefing included the general situation, the enemy situation, the Team’s mission, routes of movement, objectives, and a simple scheme of maneuver. The Team may have done well in its first fight, but it had been an easy one, conducted from stationary positions using a plan that had been developed for months. The new mission was an attack, a short notice one at that. He didn’t want to do anything fancy or complicated. Simplicity and flexibility were what he wanted.
To this end, he decided the Team would use standard battle drill and rely on their SOP. “Order of march out of the position will be the 2nd Platoon with 55 in the lead, followed by 66, the FIST track, 3rd Platoon, and the Mech Platoon,” Bannon explained. “Once across the LD, we’ll either move with the two tank platoons up and abreast and the Mech trailing, or in column with 3rd Platoon overwatching the advance of 2nd. This will put the majority of the Team’s combat power forward while leaving me some flexibility to change formations rapidly with minimum reshuffling. Detailed instructions, the artillery fire support plans, and any new information will be provided to you prior to the move. Anyone have any questions?”
Taking his time, he looked into the eyes of each of his subordinates, waiting for them to either ask him a question or shake their head. He followed this by reminding them they needed to ensure that their platoons stayed alert and on the radio. He also stressed the need to make sure they rotated with their crews when it came to sleeping. “We need to be wide awake and alert tomorrow when the Team rolls across the LD.” With that, he dismissed the platoon leaders and turned his attention over the needs of the Team and the support plan for the attack with Uleski and Harrert.
The news the first sergeant had was not good. The heavy fighting to the north had consumed huge amounts of ammunition, in particular tank main gun ammo. Because the corps ammo resupply point was still being established, division ordered the brigades to send whatever tank ammunition they had to the 1st Brigade. The result of this order meant that the rest of Team Yankee’s basic load of ammunition that was supposed to be in the battalion trains area was gone, headed north to someone else’s tanks. Too tired to work himself into a rage, Bannon simply sighed. The battalion commander and the S-3 had been there for over thirty minutes without bothering to inform him of that minor point, leaving Bannon to wonder whose side the Reynolds was on. It almost seemed as if this was some kind of test to see how far Team Yankee could go on its own.
The good news was that the Team would still get a hot meal in the morning, provided there was no interference from the Russians. New protective mask filters would be passed out at that time. Harrert, who had been working on securing them since he heard the news of the chemical attack, was confident he’d have enough replacements for the entire Team by then. An additional day’s worth of MREs would also be passed out to add to the two day’s supply already on the Team’s tracks. The Team was in good shape as far as fuel was concerned, but Bannon wanted to be sure, asking Harrert to see if he could arrange a top-off right after breakfast, provided battalion hadn’t taken the fuel too. The three of them exchanged a few sharp and humorous remarks on that subject and, with a chuckle, broke up the meeting. The first sergeant returned Uleski and McAlister to the 2nd Platoon’s positions before heading back to the trains area as Bannon, together with Unger, made their way to the FIST track where they could work on a detailed fire support plan.
Second Lt. Rodney Unger was a good FIST Team chief. He still had a lot to learn about tanks and infantry, but knew artillery and how to get it. When he was first assigned to the Team as the FIST nine months before, he still had a lot of funny ideas about what his role was and how he wanted to do business. It didn’t take long to convince him that a lot of what he had been taught at Fort Sill was best left there. Once that was accomplished, Bannon taught him all the Bad habits FIST chiefs use in the field.
While Unger worked up his initial fire plan based on what he had been given in the first sergeant’s track, Bannon sat across from him in the more spacious FIST track, going over the scheme of maneuver in more detail. He began by considering how the Soviets might be deployed to defend their flank. All likely locations and fields of fire were marked in red. Satisfied that this Russian plan of defense was plausible, Bannon took to working on the details of how the Team was going to seize its assigned objective quickly and with minimum losses. This time, he methodically went over the actions the Team had to execute in order for it to get from the line of departure to its objective. Whenever Bannon came across a Soviet field of fire he had plotted, he weighed all options before deciding how best to deal with it. If he could, he wanted to bypass them. When it wasn’t possible, he had to find a way to destroy the enemy without losing the Team in the process. He kept at this until he had charted the Team’s advance along the entire axis of advance he had been given.