Behind him, the squad leader was sitting higher up. He called down, “Where do you want us, sir?”
“If you follow us in, we’ll take you to your positions.”
“Have they dug some berms for us?”
Lieutenant Garcia turned to Park and the platoon sergeant answered, “Yes. You have two facing the northeast and two to the southeast. I suggest you place one ITV each side. That’ll give you two berms for each track.”
“Your men, sir?”
“You’ll have two squads on your left,” answered Garcia. “Along with the weapons squad, that’s where they’ll probably try and flank us. There’s a squad on your right, so watch where you go.” The lieutenant laughed. “I don’t want you running over my boys.”
“I’ll lead then, LT,” suggested Park. “You can hitch a ride.”
“You’re on, Sergeant.”
Garcia clambered up onto the M109 ITV, an Improved TOW Vehicle, crouching down next to the squad leader, Sergeant Dowling. To his left was the lowered ‘hammerhead’ turret, the TOW weapon launcher. He nearly fell off as the driver applied power to the tracks and the vehicle jerked forward.
“They coming tomorrow, Lieutenant?”
“They’ll be here alright, so get yourselves organised quickly.”
“Who’s holding them off?”
“Twelve-Cav and two companies from 2nd Battalion. But they’ll be here before the night’s out. We’ll probably see their recce first thing.”
Sergeant Park turned round and jabbed his left arm in the direction of the southeast.
“Tell your second unit to follow my platoon sergeant, and I’ll lead you to your location. I’ll set up my platoon HQ close by.”
“We’ll need to ride in behind our positions, sir. Confirm our landmarks; then pull back out of sight.”
“Yeah, fine.” Garcia tapped the hammerhead. “These babies do a good job then?”
“You bet, sir. Eighty per cent probability of a hit.”
“Keep your boys tight, Sergeant. Popov will looking to hit you during the twenty per cent.”
“Gotcha, LT.”
The vehicle spun on its tracks and headed northeast, the lieutenant guiding the driver.
“How far are we from your squads, sir?”
Garcia thought for a moment. “I’ve not looked at the positions yet, but we instructed your berms to be dug at least fifty metres from our positions.”
“When these things fire, we’ll draw their attention, that’s for sure. Once the Red Army’s tanks are less than 1,000 metres, we have orders to pull back.”
“They’ll be close enough for our Dragons then,” answered Garcia. “Here we are.”
The ITV stopped with a jolt, close to the edge of the forest, a berm carved out in front of them and the lieutenant slid down the front and off.
“I’ll need to go further forward, sir. Check out the scenery.”
“I’ll leave you to it.” Garcia patted the slab side of the ITV as it picked up speed, one of the crew now leading it through the trees.
The M109 ITV picked its way forward slowly and drove closer to the edge of the forest, only far enough so it was in a position for the squad leader to check out the lay of the land. The ground behind him was about 500 metres at its highest point, and his vehicle, along with the supporting infantry, was at roughly 200 to 300 metres. It gave him a great view of not only the valley where the Autobahn ran across the open fields towards his position, but he could also see across the open ground, apart from a few small buildings, to his left. The second ITV, 100 metres off to his right, would cover any blind spots. To his right was the berm dug out by the engineers from where he could support the mechanised infantry company dug in close by. And they, in turn, would reciprocate. His M109 ITV, replacing the older M113A1 TOW, would finally get an opportunity to show the enemy what it was capable of.
Dowling laughed to himself. The Russians were about to come up against the 3rd Armoured Division, so God help them. “Back up. I want to see the view from the berm.”
Two-Company, and its seventeen M1 Abram’s, occupied the forward slope of a set of hills that looked out onto a valley, just south of the village of Gomfritz, facing the Autobahn coming from the northeast. A company from the 1st Mechanised Infantry Battalion had been given the northern side of the valley to defend, and a company of tanks from 4th Armoured Battalion the southern. The Major checked the positions of his armour, conferring with his platoon leaders, agreeing which platoons would pull out first and which would provide over-watch.
The road was now quiet. A long column of evacuees had passed by earlier in the day. Major Anderson dropped down beside his personal Abram’s and rested his back against one of the bogie wheels where Lieutenant Hendricks, one of his platoon leaders, joined him. Anderson had a map on his knee and was examining the layout of the area the Spearhead Division had to defend.
“They’re going to roll right into us tomorrow, sir.”
“That they are, Ed, so keep your boys on the ball.”
A rumble of explosions, no more than three kilometres away, shattered the relative silence.
“Son of a bitch. The Cav and the 2nd are getting some Soviet attention.”
Major Anderson turned to his junior officer. “Yeah, but I hear the Russians are getting a bit of a stonking too.”
“Those Cobras scare me, and they’re on our side. Is Dallas ready, sir?”
Anderson slid the map across and briefed his subordinate on what he believed was the current status of Stop-Line Dallas.
As part of the preparation, for a potential invasion by the Warsaw Pact, which had been conducted over the last five years, the commander of US V Corps had instigated a number of stop-lines where his defence of the Fulda Gap and, in turn, the city of Frankfurt, would be conducted. Two of those had already been crossed. 11th Cavalry, using a rolling defence, provided the initial resistance to the Soviet invasion. Now, the responsibility had fallen to the 3rd Armoured Division to hold the final two stop-lines. The immediate one, Stop-Line Dallas, named after an American city, ran from Grafendorf northwest to Schluchtern, where the 3rd Brigade were centred, north to Freinsteinau, then west through Shotton, and north-east to Alsfeld. 1st Brigade had Alsfeld, and 2nd Brigade was on 3rd Brigade’s left flank around Freinsteinau and Shotton, the towering Vogelsberg Mountains in the middle. If they were unsuccessful in holding, the Division would pull back to Stop-Line Phoenix, a line that ran from Lohr to Friedberg, passing through Geinhausen and Glauburg. Behind the 3rd Armoured Division sat the 8th Mechanised Infantry Division, deploying behind Phoenix ready to hold ground until more reinforcements arrived.
Beyond that line, the US military was still assessing what their next action would be. All that depended on speed: speed of the Soviet advance, speed at which reinforcements could be brought into the country, and the speed at which the US air force, and other NATO air forces for that matter, could hold their ground, gain air superiority, and hit back hard at the marauding Soviet armies.