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“Ramirez! Steele! Get all the scouts in as fast as you can. We’re getting the hell out of here.”
The pair ran off in different directions.
Jensen spoke into his headset. “Change of plans guys. Here’s what we’re going to do. The Russians are falling back, but they’re still within range. Next time the Apaches attack, we’re going to open fire. With any luck, the bastards will never figure out that there’s firing coming from a second position. Take your time selecting your targets. Let’s make every TOW count. Once your missile tubes are empty, rather than backing up to reload, head straight down the hill as fast as you can toward E48. We’ll try to get away before the Russians spot us. Whatever you do, don’t look back. Just keep going. Form up in that big apple orchard just this side of Schirnding. Any questions?”
There were none.
While three Apaches commenced another run, this time from the south, the first pair of scouts returned.
“Into Brown’s Bradley,” Jensen said.
The scouts hurried into the Bradley’s rear compartment.
The Apaches pounded the disorganized column with Hellfires and chain guns. Hades’ fires grew in the valley below. Thunder roared and lightning flashed with each new explosion.
Brown locked onto a fleeing tank near what had been the front of the column. He released his first TOW. While it flew toward its target, its fins popped out and a light appeared on the missile’s rear. Using his periscope to guide it, Brown adjusted its flight toward the struggling Russian tank. In seconds, the missile covered the mile and a half. The TOW slammed into the armored vehicle with tremendous force. Half-ton pieces of flaming metal spewed into the snowy air.
Three T-72 commanders had guessed right. Each had been waiting for the next helicopter attack to come from the south. They opened up with their tanks’ antiaircraft guns and main cannons. A cannon shell ripped through the center of a soaring black helicopter. Spinning wildly out of control, the shattered remains of the Apache smashed into the woods north of the roadway.
The firing of the T-72s attracted the attention of Foster and Brown. A pair of TOWs swept from their tubes. Each began the process of homing in on its target. While the TOWs were in flight, another group of Apaches raced over the treetops. As the TOWs destroyed two more tanks, the Apaches opened up with Hellfire missiles once more.
“I’m out of here,” Brown, his missile tubes empty, yelled into the radio. And down the final mile of the north–south roadway, the first Bradley raced.
While Richmond moved forward to take Brown’s position, a second set of scouts ran up and entered the rear of Foster’s Bradley.
Austin had been tracking what he believed to be a command tank a mile back in the column. The moment Brown cleared the hilltop, Austin fired. It was a long shot. More than two miles. But it was still within the TOW’s range. The missile’s flight seemed to take forever. Austin, however, never faltered. The TOW ran true. In a blinding explosion, the lead battalion’s commanding officer died. The confusion at the head of the accursed column was now complete.
Foster launched against the final of the three T-72s involved in downing the Apache. Just as his missile neared the stationary tank, its commander decided to start his retreat. At the last possible instant, unaware that certain death was bearing down upon it, the T-72 moved. The TOW missed by inches. It passed in front of the tank and smashed into a snowbank near the tree line.
“Shit! I missed the son of a bitch. I’m out of here, too.” And with that, Foster’s Bradley charged over the hill. Following Brown’s lead, it disappeared down the snow-clogged path leading to E48. Austin fired his second TOW toward a scurrying BMP. Within its walls, ten Russians died the instant the missile’s powerful nose struck. One more funeral pyre was added to the multitudes in the flaming valley below.
As Austin’s second missile rammed home, Brown’s team turned west onto E48. At thirty-five miles per hour, the Bradley hastened to escape.
Two more scouts arrived and scurried up the open ramp at the rear of Richmond’s Bradley. The hatch closed behind them. Renoir moved the final Bradley into position.
It was Austin’s turn to try his luck on the highway. “We’re gone!” he yelled. The third Bradley crested the hill and raced to slip the hangman’s noose.
The disorganized Russian column, filled with fire and death, continued to withdraw. With Austin out of the way, Richmond hurled a TOW at a T-80. The sergeant led the speeding armored vehicle by too much and missed the inviting target. As the last sprinting scouts appeared through the storm with Ramirez and Steele, Renoir fired the first of his missiles. Another BMP’s crew didn’t have long to live.
“Load up! Load up!” Jensen screamed at the top of his lungs. He could barely be heard over the tumultuous sounds in the valley below.
The final scouts raced to the rear of Renoir’s Bradley. Out of breath, Ramirez and Steele ran to the Humvee.
The third group of Apaches, again running right down the flaming valley floor, attacked the retreating column. Death poured from the heavens in the form of Hellfire missiles and 30mm chain-gun fire. This time, however, the cat was far too greedy and spent too much time feasting on the mouse. While the Apaches roared down the length of the endless column, fifteen tanks opened fire. A curtain of deadly fire closed in on the Americans.
The trailing Apache’s rotor was crushed by a pair of direct hits. The low-flying helicopter smashed into the flaming wreckage of one of its earlier victims. One hundred yards farther into the valley, the lead Apache was struck by no fewer than ten antiaircraft shells. Its pilot attempted a steep turn to the right, away from the line of fire. The Apache exploded in midair. The middle Apache banked sharply to the left to avoid the sudden explosion of its brother. It somehow survived its scrape with death, disappearing over the treetops.
Foster’s Bradley turned onto E48 and plowed west through the storm.
Jensen was on his headset once again. “Forget about firing your TOWs. Let’s get out of here while we still can!”
The words still ringing in his ears, Richmond’s Bradley tore from the platoon’s hiding place. It leaped over the hill and was gone. Renoir followed a few seconds behind. The Humvee trailed what remained of the platoon.
The Americans would still need some luck. After the mauling they’d taken, the Russians were furiously pulling back from the battle site. Should they spot the fleeing mosquitoes, however, they were still easily within range to quickly end all of the cavalrymen’s lives. Fortunately, the panicked enemy was much too busy searching for death from above to concern themselves with anything else.
With the Russians watching the dagger-filled skies for the next attack, Jensen’s men slipped away, one vehicle at a time. Each raced west to escape the valley floor. When they slid around the corner onto E48, the three soldiers in the Humvee could feel the intense heat from the tangle of burning giants a quarter mile away. Every few seconds, more rounds would cook off, exploding in the raging fires. With each new burst, the Humvee’s crew would involuntarily duck. They understood the next explosion they heard could be from the 125mm cannon of an alert enemy tank that had spotted the fleeing Humvee. Although Jensen knew if that happened, they would never h
ear the sound of the detonating shell before it killed them all.
Both sides had had enough.
Licking their wounds, the six surviving Apaches turned and headed for home. Behind them, scores of ravaged armored vehicles lay burning in the snows. An impassable wall of death and destruction reached from tree line to tree line.
The Apaches, with a helping hand from Jensen’s platoon, had blocked E48.
The Humvee rounded a final forest curve and disappeared.
CHAPTER 14
January 29—12:25 a.m.
2nd Platoon, Delta Troop, 1st Squadron, 4th Cavalry
Outside the Town of Schirnding
At the end of the burning valley, the forest gave way to an area of small farms and modest villages. Two miles ahead lay the town of Schirnding. On its eastern edge, an ancient apple orchard dominated both sides of the highway.
The magnificent orchard was a beautiful sight during the platoon’s drives to the border in April, when the trees were beginning to bloom, and again in July, when the apples were ripening. The orchard was pretty in a different sort of way in October, when autumn’s vivid hues tumbled down in torrents upon the passing soldiers.
During the platoon’s drives to the border in January, however, there was nothing attractive about the ghostly trees that hung still and lifeless in a cold gray world.
The platoon began assembling along the roadway in the bleak orchard. First, Brown and his men arrived, driving through the trees and stopping near the edge of the quaint town. Foster and his crew were a mile behind.
With the continual explosions, it was impossible to know what had happened to those they’d left behind. Each new arrival quickly got out of his Bradley to peer back down the snowbound roadway to see if anyone else had survived. One by one, the lumbering fighting vehicles arrived safe and sound. And when the Humvee was spotted in the distance, there was actually a feeble cheer from the spent platoon.
