Casca 11: The Legionnaire (14 page)

Reinforcements arrived nearly every day adding to their strength. The work was endless. Strong points were built with interlocking fields of fire, each of them given the name of a girl. To the north was Gabrielle, then clockwise Beatrice, which covered the trail leading between the mountains to the Black River. And astride the southern route to Na Sam, Isabelle, then Claudine followed by Lalaine.

During the first weeks, French patrols were able to keep the road open though it was not achieved, as they thought by the strength of their arms, but by Giap's orders. Minor skirmishes took place with increasing frequency but never severe enough to hinder the build
-up. Giap knew it would not do to have the French become too suspicious by giving them no opposition at all. It would simply not be credible.

Ever so gradually, Giap began to increase the pressure. The patrols of the defenders became more limited in their scope as they ran into stiffer opposition. The roads were mined and cut, leaving the garrison to depend totally on the air for their supplies. By the end of January, Giap had in his web twelve battalions from the 13th DBE, the 2nd and 3rd REI, and 1st BEP. Giap made one more masterstroke before turning his full attention to Dien Bien Phu. Knowing Navarre had always expected him to invade Laos, he sent units of his prized 316th Division toward Luang Prabang, overrunning the French garrison at Moung Khoua. On the seventeenth of February, lead elements of the 316th were in sight of Luang
Prabang. Navarre did as Giap expected and sent in five battalions to defend the city, battalions that could not now be sent to Dien Bien Phu. Giap kept them occupied there for a time then ordered his division back. He had a greater need for them now that they had served their purpose in Laos. Giap gave his orders and his guns were finally brought into play, though not fully committed. It was not yet time. He needed to wear his enemy down and deprive them of even the comfort of sleep. He would work on their nerves until each man was totally exhausted. Men in that state make mistakes, and right now Giap had time on his side.

For the time being Langer's platoon had been assigned to Beatrice, where his old unit the 13th DBE was in residence. Patrols went out around the clock, mostly at night, using the cover of darkness to move into the trees red Indian fashion and search out the positions of the enemy. They set up booby traps of their own, laid mines, then got back to the safety of their own wire before the Viets found them.

When they weren't on patrol they were digging. Langer and the others were constantly excavating new trenches, filling sandbags, building bunkers or stringing new aprons of wire. Sores ate at his armpits. The constant sweat and grime that built up in the seams of his jacket made the threads like tiny saws, ripping at the skin a millimeter every time he moved. Gus sat in the corner of a sandbagged wall, popping lice between his thick fingernails. Every now and then he would search the dark mass of hair on his chest and arms, picking through the brush as if he were a baboon. Then, when he had found his prey, he would hold it up for all to witness and triumphantly exclaim to the world: "Behold, now I have once more proved the invincibility of the Legionnaire over the insidious forces of Indochina." He would gloat as he crushed the tiny beast between his nails.

"So die all who would deny us our rightful place in this country, where we should be permitted to rape, pillage, and plunder without hindrance." At this point he would touch his finger to his nose and whisper as if to a conspirator, "You do know that raping and ravaging clears up the zits, don't you?"

Langer had seen the routine too many times in Russia to be impressed and Dominic would merely smile patiently at the antics of his large hairy friend and continue to sharpen his trench knife to a fine edge. Much of Dominic's good looks had faded and he seemed somehow smaller in height. His eyes were sunken and hot looking. Every day he was coming a little closer to the razor's edge. He grew thinner and was unable to sleep. Still he just smiled and nodded his head in approval at whatever Gus was doing and continued to sharpen his knife.

Langer was getting worried. He had seen too many men get that same look in their eyes, eyes that only came alive when they were killing. If they weren't careful, Dominic was going to get himself killed. The man was beginning to like his work too much. He became downright irritable if he was denied the right to go on patrol every night. Exhaustion takes its toll on everyone differently and in the once dashing Italian, it was planting the seeds of madness. He was having to draw on his inner strength to function. Every night he ate a bit more of himself and every day there was less of the old Dominic left.

On the night of the thirteenth of March, Giap ordered that the battle be fully joined. His artillery opened up in all its strength. Two hundred guns rolled their thunder of fire over the valley as his men began their assault. By now he had fifty thousand men in his command against the eleven thousand of the French below him. His first objective: The bastion of Beatrice and the men of the 13th DBE. Taking Beatrice was vital for his artillery. If he could place guns on its crest, direct fire could be aimed at the heart of the main camp. In addition he wanted to make an example of the 13th. When the demi-brigade landed in Indochina it was almost completely German. Now it was almost half Vietnamese. He would let those who served the French know the fate which awaited them. No Vietnamese Legionnaires were to be taken alive. It was with great satisfaction that he gave the order to his
gros canons
. Fire!

The world caved in on them. Gus rose from the wreckage of the machine gun bunker, which served as home for him and his friends. He lifted a large log on his shoulders to permit Langer and Dominic to crawl out. Around them, flares were illuminating the night sky in eye searing bursts of light. The barrage continued rolling back and forth over the outpost, blasting gaps in the wire and tearing pathways through the mine fields for the advancing waves of Viet Minh "Death Volunteers. At 0610 hours the commander of Beatrice called for the French guns of Colonel Piroth to fire on his own positions. At 0630 hours, he and his staff were killed by a direct hit on their bunker. Other attacks were being made at the same time on Lalaine and Gabrielle to keep them from being able to give any support to Beatrice, the Viet's main objective.

Hermann was a prick but he was a tough soldier. Racing bent over he threw a light machine gun at Gus and told him to get to work. Langer searched through the rubble of the bunker, found his Mats 49, grabbed some extra magazines and threw himself against what remained of the bunker wall. Dominic worked as a loader for Gus. The initial shock of the barrage was now lifting to permit the Viet infantry to advance. With a vengeance, the Legionnaires of the 13th DBE came out of their holes to face the human waves of Oriental faces that were sweeping toward them. Ignoring their own casualties they used the bodies of their own wounded and dead to throw on top of barbed wire barriers, then used them as bridges to cross over the wire barriers. From three sides the Viets swarmed over everything between them and their objective. They would take Beatrice this night or die in the attempt. Hundreds of them did perish in the first few minutes. Langer tried to pick his shots but there was no sense in it; there was no way to miss. Gus raked his weapon from side to side like a scythe, the light machine gun cutting down men in packs as Dominic kept the belts feeding into the breech.

Cries warning of their coming came from two sides of the camp. Without being told, the Legionnaires of the 13th fixed their bayonets as the first wave of Viet Minh charged into the outer perimeter. Coming out of their trenches and holes the Legionnaires met them with steel. A thousand individual combats took place in the burning light of a dozen flares.

Gus picked up his machine gun. The damned thing had a stoppage and there was no time to reduce it. He swung the twenty pound weapon like a club, crushing the brain case of a Viet
Dai Ui
. The enemy captain died but behind him came four more straight for the bunker. Langer took out two before his weapon ran dry and, as with Gus, there was no time to reload. Using the lessons learned in Russia, he used an entrenching tool to stab one of them. He had to hold the still kicking body down to free the sharpened blade of the shovel from the victim's chest. Dominic didn't wait for the next one to reach them. He went out over the top of the trench after him, forgetting in the heat of battle that his knife was his only weapon. He'd left his rifle behind. Parrying like a ballet dancer, he dodged the thrust from a Russian bayonet and slit the man's throat as he went past. Then he went after two more he'd spotted hung up in the wire. When the Viets saw him coming they broke and ran behind leaving large portions of their hide on the wire. They ran back the way they had come, only to be shot immediately by their own officers.

Hermann was throwing grenades like a madman, as fast as he could pull the pins. The crews in the mortar pits were setting their weapons so the rounds went nearly straight up to fall within yards of their own positions. They had to fall back, dropping grenades down the tubes of their mortars to prevent the Viets from taking them.

An order from a Viet Minh major to take some prisoners brought another rush of Viets into the bunker where Langer was with the others. They never left the bunker alive. The small men tried to swarm over Gus like the lice in the hair on his back and chest. He shook them off, breaking their necks with his paws. He was bleeding from a dozen cuts as Dominic and Langer butchered the ones Gus didn't kill. The bodies of the dead Viets, as well as a couple who weren't quite dead, were tossed back up on top of the sandbags to give them some additional cover. Machine gun bullets from their own comrades ended the cries for mercy from the wounded Viet Minh.

From the north wall came the cry, “Reculez!" telling them to fall back. The Viets were in among them. Giap's men came in so thick that if weapons burned out barrels or jammed, their owners had to fight with whatever they could get their hands on. As it had been so many times on the Russian front, there were just too many of them to kill. An entire trench of Legionnaires were smothered by hundreds of Vietnamese who literally buried them under their bodies. Many of the Viets in their haste to kill, exploded hand grenades, holding them to their bodies as they hurled themselves at the hated Legionnaires. They died but they had achieved their purpose. Another breach was made in the line and a thousand more of their comrades poured through in a flood of blood.

A Chinese potato masher grenade went off, stunning Dominic. Gus picked up the Italian, throwing him over his shoulder as he fled. Grabbing his machine gun on the way, he pulled back to a mortar pit twenty meters to the rear as Langer gave him covering fire. The Viets pushed the defenders back foot by foot and every one of them paid for in death. Men lay in clumps together locked in the death struggle. The radio operator of the 13th frantically called for more fire support from the other outposts. Not much came. They had their own problems to deal with. Using a Walther P-38, the operator killed three Viet Minh who burst into the door of his bunker before a burst from the Ppsh 41 sniper's rifle tore his chest out of him and smashed his radio. The fight raged back and forth but the weight of the Viet Minh attack was not to be denied. For the French, with every passing minute there were fewer men to resist the human tide rolling over them. At last they held only one bunker on the west wall.

Gus got Dominic back to consciousness and they were working again. Langer blew two Viets off Herman’s back. Even if they didn't like the son of a bitch they needed every man
. Hermann thought nothing of it. He had other things on his mind, namely strangling to death a Viet Minh sargent.

Finally realizing it was hopeless, Hermann yelled out for Langer and the others to follow him. Leaping over dead bodies they ran for the wire, searching by the glaring light of the flares for the small colored markers that showed the safe route out of the camp. Crawling and scrambling, they twisted their way past bodies, not having time to stop and kill the wounded Viet Minh. Shots and grenades followed after them. The camp was doomed, of that they were certain. There was nothing they could do to save their comrades left behind. Even now they were being put to the bayonet as the Viet Minh looted their bodies, taking everything that could be used. Bodies were stripped naked of their uniforms and boots, and rings were cut off swollen fingers. Nearly three hundred men of the 13th died. But almost two hundred had managed to break out. They headed back to the apron of wire surrounding the airstrip, responding to the challenge of trigger happy sentries with curses as they crawled belly down through the wire. Two men following Gus were blown up by their own mines. Four Poles died when they didn't respond fast enough to challenges spoken in French. Once they were recognized, hands pulled them over the sides.

There were few questions as to what had happened. By the light of a flare, they saw the red Viet Minh flag being raised. Beatrice had fallen. The first victory went to Giap, but he had paid a price for it. Nearly two thousand of his own men had sent their spirits to their ancestors and a like number were returned to the mountain hospitals with wounds.

Dry mouthed, chests pounding, the survivors gratefully accepted the offer of canteens. Gus rose up and looked around to see who was left. He gave Hermann a dirty look, saying testily. "I see you're still with us. I never have any luck at all." Hermann was too exhausted to respond. He lay, sides heaving, on the floor of a foxhole. He would remember the insult later. Right now it was tough enough just to catch his breath.