1920: America's Great War-eARC (35 page)

“I pray they will be in time,” said Sims. “But in the name of God, what about poison gas? Could the Germans be barbaric enough to introduce it?”

Poison gas had not been used by either side in the 1914 War, but the Germans had used it in Russia against the Reds. The horrific results had stunned the world and further cast the kaiser in the role of Attila the Hun.

Liggett glared. “When you consider their other atrocities, why not?”

“With respect, sirs,” Luke injected, “I think it’s highly unlikely they’ll introduce gas. The prevailing winds are from the west-northwest, which means they’d likely blow the gas back over the German lines.”

“What a pleasant thought, Luke. Are you a hundred per cent certain of that?” Liggett asked.

“No sir, I’m not. There could always be exceptions. Also, I have no idea how many German casualties the kaiser’s oldest son is willing to accept in order to achieve victory. Having gone this far, however, I think they Germans would be willing to accept enormous casualties to achieve their goals.”

CHAPTER 22

The final bombardment began at first light. The shells landed on the area where Luke and Ike had predicted. Now they could only hope it wasn’t a well-orchestrated feint. There was no corresponding shelling of American positions on von Hutier’s front.

This time, Luke was prudently far back. Still, as before, the ground shuddered and shook. He recalled the feeling of terror he’d had just a few days earlier when the shells rained down on the bunker. Kirsten was already at the hospital and this time she would be helping with the growing influx of wounded. Letter writing and bookkeeping could come later.

“Poor bloody infantry,” said a familiar voice.

“Hello Reggie, and are you supposed to be here?”

“Dashing young correspondents can dash about wherever they wish,” Carville said as he dumped down a suitcase. “And I have a chit from Liggett that says so, and another one from the kaiser himself if I should happen to be picked up by those nice people from Berlin. Just don’t ask how I happened to come by it.”

Overhead, scores of German planes dipped and swooped like gulls skimming the sea. Only they were strafing the trenches and not looking for fish. Or were they, Luke thought. Maybe they were looking for human fish. Gotha bombers dropped their loads from height and succeeded in hitting not much at all. The explosions, however, were impressive, and must have added to the primal fear of the men underneath them.

Reggie laughed. “High-level bombing is very much a work in process.”

“Thank God.”

“Ah, and here comes the infantry, entering stage left.”

As before, waves of Germans flowed out of their trenches and around their own barbed wire. They hadn’t gone far before the American barrage opened up on them, this time with much more intensity than before. There was no longer reason to save shells or hide guns. The American front had been strengthened by troops from other areas. Luke could only hope that neither the crown prince nor General Mackensen realized that the rest of the American line was virtually defenseless.

This time concentrated machine-gun fire came from the Americans and not the Germans, and Luke exulted. Men were dying in great bloody piles, but they were Germans, not Americans.

But the Germans were coming on. More left their trenches and began the inexorable move to reinforce the first wave. Behind them, Luke made out a third wave forming and a fourth. Mackensen had done the same thing Liggett had. All of the German Army was in front of him. He felt the sickening reality that the German weight of numbers and firepower would still prevail. He got up.

“Where to now?” Reggie asked.

“Back to headquarters. Liggett will want to know about this firsthand. What are you going to do?”

Carville smiled, and Luke noticed that his eyes were cold. “Why, I believe I’ll just sit here until the Germans arrive and see if any of them want to be interviewed.”

* * *

Admiral Hipper received word of the main infantry attack. He angrily paced the bridge of the
Bayern
. He was frustrated. The moment of glory was at hand and all he could see was fog, damned bloody fog. He couldn’t see more than a few feet in front of him. He heard one of the junior officers joking that he had just made an obscene gesture to himself and couldn’t see it. He felt like strangling the little snot.

The German fleet was approximately ten miles off the coast of California and, if his navigators were any good, directly in front of the Golden Gate, the entrance to San Francisco Bay.

But he couldn’t do anything. Not only because of the promise he’d made to the crown prince, but because moving towards the coast would be foolhardy, not brave. And if he managed to ground one or more of his battleships, or God help him, the whole fleet, he and the German Navy would be disgraced for all eternity.

However, he had to do something. The ship moved forward at dead slow, barely moving. The other behemoth battleships crawled slowly as well in response to his orders. They were in line abreast, which meant there was little or no danger of a rear end collision. When—if?—the damned fog lifted, they’d be in position to move quickly. That is, if the minesweepers could clear the channel in enough time.

“Oh,” someone said and the ship was suddenly bathed in wonderful, miraculous sunshine. And straight in front of them was the Golden Gate. Hipper exultantly pounded his fist into the palm of his hand while others clapped and cheered. Not only had the fog lifted, but, thanks to superb navigation, he’d managed to creep close to the American shore without being seen. He laughed. Perhaps fog wasn’t a bad thing after all.

“Send in the minesweepers.”

Hipper gave the order and it was relayed to the small, M-Class minesweepers that had all been built in the previous couple of years. The need for them hadn’t existed until the Royal Navy had sown thousands of mines in the waters off Germany in the 1914 War.

The task of the sixteen knot, 360-ton craft was doubly dangerous. First was their primary purpose—finding and removing mines so the fleet could charge through the channel to the bay. Second, they had to do this while enduring the American shore batteries at nearly point-blank range. Hipper thought all the crews of fifty men on each ship deserved medals.

“They’re doomed,” said Trotha from his position behind him.

Hipper didn’t want to look through his binoculars at what likely to be their destruction. He simply nodded. In a few moments, the American shore batteries opened fire. Near miss shells lifted enormous amounts of water much higher than the puny sweepers as they pushed forward.

Suddenly, one of them disappeared as a shell struck it, causing it to disintegrate in a cloud of splinters and human flesh. Hipper winced and Trotha cursed. Still, the brave little ships attempted to do their duty. They were inside the channel and taking fire from two directions. Now gunfire came from a third direction, as the guns from Alcatraz Island joined in. A second minesweeper was hit, and then a third was turned into a flaming ruin. All the batteries focused on the remaining one. A message blinked from a signal light. Her radio must be gone, Hipper thought. A shell struck her and she too began to sink. The American guns ceased fire. All four brave ships were destroyed, but had they succeeded?

He translated the Morse code from the last mine sweeper—No mines. “Damn them to hell,” Hipper raged. No mines. He had sacrificed four ships and two hundred men for nothing.

But had he? They now knew exactly where the American guns were located and how big they were. This would help immeasurably when he sent in his battleships.

Trotha was reading his mind, “When, Admiral?”

It was nearly noon. Hipper made up his mind quickly, “Now.”

* * *

Luke found Patton and his huge metal creatures a few miles from where the Germans were attacking. They were in a large grove of trees and hidden from sight. The thunder of battle, however, was loud and clear. With others around, he kept it formal and saluted.

“Change of plans, General.”

Patton poked his head out from the turret of his command tank. He was grease-covered and filthy, a long way from the officer who was so punctilious about his uniform.

“What the hell are you talking about, Acting Major Martell? I’m ready to launch a counterattack in a matter of moments, and it’s all based on the fact that the intelligence you and Ike gave me is proving accurate. You have noticed the firing off to the west, haven’t you?”

“I have indeed, Acting General Patton, and that’s the concern.”

“The hell with anybody’s concerns,” Patton snapped. “When the Germans are tied up in our trenches I’m going to hit their flank and roll them up. We’re gonna go through them like shit through a goose.”

Luke shook his head. “Harbord wants your tanks behind our lines as a means of blunting their attack.”

Patton turned red. “Bullshit. Not only is that bad tactics but it’s damned near impossible as well. Using tanks like that would be a waste of their potential. They’d get ground up in a fight and destroyed. No, we use them as planned.”

Luke glanced around and whispered. “Harbord’s given orders, George.”

“Look about and what do you see?”

Luke did as told. “George, I see scores of tanks and what look like armored trucks hidden under tarps and covered with branches. I also don’t seem them being attacked by any German planes. Good job, George.”

“Damned straight it’s a good job. I’ve assembled all fifty tanks and more than a hundred lightly armored trucks with machine guns to follow up the tanks when we attack. It’s taken me more than a week to bring them here without anybody noticing and camouflage them from the German planes, which, if you and General Harbord haven’t noticed, rule the skies. If I even attempt to move them where Harbord wants them, every German plane they have will attack them. At least most of the tanks should make it through a strafing, but the trucks will be slaughtered. Their side armor isn’t that thick and they have nothing on top. In short, nearly half my force won’t make it to where Harbord thinks he wants them.

“And one other thing, Major Martell, even if the tanks did make it, it won’t be today. I just can’t pick them up and change their direction like that. They aren’t fucking chess pieces and Harbord knows that.”

Luke was of the opinion that Patton was trying to blow smoke up his ass regarding the time necessary to move his outfit—that was typical Patton. But the man did have good points. Tanks were radical new weapons and certainly not designed to slug it out in the trenches. Striking the German flank and rear, like cavalry of old, did seem like the logical way of using them. He decided to change the subject a little.

“George, what are those things draped on the tanks?”

Patton grinned happily, “Another one of my brilliant ideas. Those are heavy rope cables and I got them in Seattle. It occurred to me that the wheels and tracks of the tanks and trucks were the most vulnerable, so I’ve draped woven ropes where they’re most needed. The ropes are lightweight and bulletproof.”

Luke wondered just what the hell else was going on in Patton’s fertile mind. “George, when are you attacking?”

“In an hour or so.”

Luke rolled his eyes and looked skyward. No German planes were in sight. He made his decision. “I suggest you make it sooner, George, and I never found you.”

* * *

Once upon a time, Tim Randall thought trees were beautiful and loved to spend as much time as he could in a park or in the country. Not now. Everywhere he looked in Washington, Oregon, and northern California there were trees. The Pacific coast states were nothing but one long pine forest, and a snow-covered pine forest at that.

What he’d naively proclaimed would take only a couple of days had taken more than a week and they still hadn’t arrived at their destination. Everyone grudgingly admitted that they were closing in on San Francisco, but you couldn’t tell it by looking out a window. The troops saw nothing but snow-covered trees.

Nor had the trip been totally safe. Stuffed as they were in boxcars, many soldiers came down with colds that devolved into pneumonia. Always present was the fear that influenza would again rear its ugly head. Their company commander was in a hospital a couple of hundred miles to their north, which meant that Lieutenant Taylor was now the CO and Sergeant Tim Randall now ran the platoon. Christ, Tim thought, next thing, they’d make him an officer. Would that be such a bad thing? His family would be proud, sort of. The latest letters he’d received still bitterly held him responsible for Wally’s death. He’d pretty well decided he wasn’t going back to Camden. He couldn’t bring himself to hate his parents, but he’d be damned if he would let their bitterness dominate his life. He hadn’t put a gun to Wally’s head and forced him to enlist. No, Wally had been an adult and had volunteered. Wally had been as insistent as Tim that they join the Army. Who the hell knew a bug would kill him?

At least the letters he continued to get from Kathy Fenton were uplifting. After a rocky beginning, the two of them were getting to know each other pretty well as a result of their correspondence. He’d told her he wasn’t returning to Camden and implied that she should join him wherever he landed and she’d seemed intrigued. First, of course, there was the little matter of the war.

He yawned. General MacArthur had done a great job of getting them headed south. Tim was actually on the first train. Scores of other trains were coming along behind him, sooner or later. More than fifty thousand men were en route to San Francisco, which, according to MacArthur’s frequent bulletins and announcements, desperately needed them.

One of his men looked out the cracked door of the boxcar. They were fairly warm and out of the wind as long as it was closed, and by now they were used to sleeping on either the hard ground or the hard wooden floor of the boxcar. At least it wasn’t snowing inside. He seemed to recall reading that California was sunny and bright, but obviously the author of that epistle had been terribly misinformed.

The train began to slow. Damn, another stop. They’d get out, stretch their legs, piss, and wait to get started up again. At least pissing while standing on the ground was better than aiming a stream through one of the many cracks in the floor while the train was moving. Like little kids, some of the guys had made a contest of it.

“Everybody out and take all your shit!”

They didn’t know who said it, but they all complied. They wondered what the hell was happening now. They formed up and walked forward and past the engine. They paused and stared. A large body of water lay before them and a couple of miles beyond that was a city. South of the city, greasy black smoke rose skyward and now they could just hear the sounds of artillery.

They had reached San Francisco, or, more precisely, Oakland, California. Oakland had once been the western terminus of the Transcontinental Railroad. Originally, ferries were used to ship railroad cars across to San Francisco, but now it was the hub from which other lines led, including the Dumbarton Railroad Bridge at the southern end of the bay. However, the Dumbarton Bridge, which ran into the southern part of the peninsula, had been damaged by German shelling. Realization that the fighting they’d seen in Texas would be as nothing in comparison with the hell the Germans were serving up was beginning to sink in.