Castro's Bomb (13 page)

"Where's my bazooka?" Hartford hollered.
 

Two men with a bazooka ran from the relative safety of the bunker and managed to get almost alongside the tank.
 
They aimed and fired quickly, striking it in its more vulnerable flank.
 
The tank shuddered and stopped.
 
The hatches opened and smoke billowed out as the crew jumped down.
 
One Cuban was one fire.
 
He rolled on the ground and lay still.
 
The other Cubans ignored him and ran back to their lines.
 
The two Marines with the bazooka started to run back to the bunker, but machine gun fire chopped them down.
 
Heroes, Hartford thought, almost in tears, but dead heroes.
 
He had to get their names.
 
He was reasonably certain that one of them was his fat little prick of a clerk, Fleming.
 
Jesus, how could he have misjudged the kid?
 

He pounded the bunker's wall in frustration.
 
Why the hell didn't they have some of the new TOW missiles that were wire guided and could be fired from the relative safety of the bunker?
 
No, the best they could do was bazookas that had been old during the Korean War and had to be fired against the side or rear of a Russian made tank in order to be effective, which meant that anyone who took on a tank with a bazooka had to be either very brave or very foolish.

He quickly counted at least twenty-five Cubans dead and wounded on the ground before him.
 
A check of his men revealed one dead and six wounded, along with the two men who'd killed the tank.
 
A white flag showed from the Cuban lines and a voice yelled out in English that they wanted a truce to pick up their wounded.
 
Hartford agreed and a handful of medics from both sides ran out nervously and gathered their dead and wounded onto stretchers.
 
It was incongruous decency in the middle of a killing field.

Hartford turned to his second in command, Captain Tom Keppel.
 
"Always try to keep a tidy battlefield," he said bitterly.
 
"You never know when someone might drop in unexpectedly and run a surprise inspection."

Keppel shook his head.
 
"How long you think we can hold out?"

"As long as we have to, I suppose."

That was a lie and he said it so the others could hear and be encouraged, if only for a moment.
 
There were now at least a couple of hundred Cuban soldiers in front of him with more coming, and not all of them could be as bad as the militia unit he'd just decimated.
 
Worse, half a dozen tanks were rolling across the ruined runway and were making for his position.
 
Yes they'd managed to knock out the one T34, which was burning fiercely a hundred yards in front of them, but they no longer had a bazooka or anything else that would stop armor, and it looked like they were confronting the entire Cuban army.

Keppel laughed bitterly.
 
"Major, surely you're not waiting for divisions of Negro soldiers on white horses to come to our rescue."

"And why not?" Sam asked.
 
At least Keppel knew his history.
 
In the early months of World War II in the Pacific, the situation facing American soldiers on Bataan in the Philippines grew so bad that many of the starving men became delusional and actually believed that Franklin Delano Roosevelt was going to send tens of thousands of colored soldiers on white horses to rescue them.
 
Just how the hell they were going to get across the Pacific to the Bataan Peninsula did not occur to those men whose minds had slipped so far away from reality.
 
No, there would be no Negro soldiers on white horses.
 
He had to confront reality, not fantasy.

His radio operator waved him over and Sam moved slowly through a bunker filled jammed with humanity.
 
"What is it?"

The radioman looked astonished.
 
"Sir, it’s President Kennedy."

Kennedy leaned over the table and spoke into the microphone.
 
"Major Hartford, I want to know just what is going on.
 
Apparently, you are the only person with whom we can communicate right now.
 
What is your situation in Guantanamo and please start from the beginning?
 
All I'm getting here are rumors."

"Okay, sir," Hartford said.
 
His voice came through surprisingly clear.
 
"About an hour and a half ago our radar detected a large number of enemy planes inbound.
 
They arrived and began bombing about the same time Cuban artillery started heavy shelling.
 
Large numbers of Cuban tanks and other armor, along with infantry in trucks, blew past our outposts.
 
To the best of my knowledge, all of our planes were destroyed on the ground and almost all of what little light armor we had was caught in motor pools where the enemy planes and guns destroyed them.
 
Also, the airfields have been cratered by bombs and shells so that take offs and landings are impossible.
 
It was a well designed and well-coordinated attack that has made us almost defenseless."

Kennedy took deep breath.
 
"Where are O'Donnell and Killen?"

"No idea, sir, but I think the main command center has been destroyed."

"Are you in communication with any other American forces?"

"No sir, not a single one."

"Then you're telling me that the base has been overrun and almost totally captured."

There was the crumping sound of an explosion in the background.
 
"What was that?" Kennedy asked.

"Cuban mortars, sir.
 
We just beat off one of their attacks and they're pissed.
 
And to answer your question, to the best of my knowledge we are it."
 
To emphasize his point, a Cuban machine gun opened up, adding to the background noise heard in the White House.

"Just how far from the front lines are you, major?"

Hartford laughed angrily and Kennedy winced.
 
"Maybe three feet, sir.
 
Hell, this is the front line.
 
One command bunker and some trenches we dug around it."

"How many people with you?" the president asked.

"Maybe a hundred still combat ready, but with only light arms, and another twenty wounded.
 
Also, I've got a couple of dozen civilians, and that includes women and children, hunkered down with us."

Jesus, Kennedy thought.
 
American women and children were in harm's way and about to be overrun and possibly killed?
 
It gets worse and worse.
 
"How long can you hold out?"

"If they attack in force, maybe ten minutes.
 
Sir, they're lining up tanks about a quarter mile away and there's nothing we're gonna be able to do to stop them from literally shelling us to pieces and running right over us.
 
We are totally out of anti-tank weapons.
 
They're gonna run right through us like shit through a goose.
 
And, sir, they gotta know that planes from the mainland will be arriving real soon, so they got a limited amount of time to take us out.
 
They'll attack in a very few minutes, so, unless you got some better idea, I'm gonna seriously consider surrendering."

Kennedy sighed.
 
He could not put the picture of American marines, along with women and children, being crushed by tanks out of his mind.
 
"You have my permission to do whatever you think best."
      

Captain Dudley scribbled on a piece of White House stationery and pushed it to the President.
 
It read, “Please give him a direct order to surrender.
 
Otherwise, he might hesitate and cost lives.
 
Or he will always be second guessed and reviled for surrendering.”

Kennedy read the note and nodded.
 
"Major Hartford, I am giving you a direct order.
 
Can others hear me?"

"Yes sir."

"Good.
 
You will surrender immediately.
 
Immediately, major, and that is a direct order from me, your Commander in Chief.
 
I am directing you to do that to save lives.
 
Do you understand and will you comply?"

"Yes sir."

"Then goodbye and good luck to all of you, major."

"Thank you, sir."

After a moment, JFK grabbed Dudley's note.
 
He wrote "concur" and signed his name along with the time and date.
 
He handed the note to Dudley.
 
"Good job, captain.
 
I should have thought of it myself.
 
You keep this and if any son of a bitch tries to smear that Hartford man, you show it to him."

Dudley nodded, folded the now priceless document and stuffed it in his pocket.
 
He would make a copy of it on the White House’s brand new Xerox 914 Copier and keep the original for himself.
      

Marinda Alvarez and her teenage nephew listened with pleasure as Cuban guns and bombs pounded the hated Guantanamo naval base.

      
"I cannot believe it is finally happening," laughed Manuel Hidalgo.
 
"It is so long overdue.
 
The Americans have caused us so much suffering and for so long."

Marinda hugged her nephew.
 
Normally, he protested such acts of affection as unbecoming to a growing young man, but these were special circumstances and, besides, they were alone in the squalid little hut they called home.
 

Marinda was forty years old and a widow, and most days she felt every minute of her years and looked much older.
 
She had worked as a field hand, laborer, housecleaner, or anything else to get food to put on her table and the occasional cash to spend on rum or tobacco.
 
Five years ago, her husband had been beaten to death by Batista's thugs for daring to suggest that a labor union might be a good thing.
 
They hadn't even let her collect his body.
 
It had been dumped into the sea, and she still cried each night at the thought of sharks devouring him.
 
Every night before she went to bed she kissed the fading photo that was all she had left of the man she’d loved and married.

Manuel's mother had died in childbirth, from lack of proper medical care.
 
He sometimes thought he was responsible for her death, but both his father and Marinda had assured him that it had been the fault of the criminals in Havana who had deprived the poor of Oriente Province of what they needed to live.
 

Once, the two of them had a normal life, or as normal as it could be under the corrupt Batista regime that had been dominated by the criminals from the United States.
 
But then came Fidel Castro and his promises of justice and a better life.
 
Castro had turned guerilla and wound up in the nearby Sierra Maestra Mountains where he and a handful of loyal followers had hidden from Batista's soldiers until those wonderful days when they arose and the Batista regime had collapsed.
 

On more than one occasion, Marinda and Manuel had actually sneaked into the wilderness with food for Fidel and his men, and they had actually met the tall and bearded charismatic leader.
 
Manuel had been transfixed by the power of the Fidel's personality and believed his promises of a better life in the future.
 
Manuel vowed to serve Castro and Cuba, in that order.

When Castro came to power, he began to make good on his promises to the poor of Cuba.
 
Medical services were beginning to be provided and there were promises of electricity.
 
With electricity, Manuel had hopes of getting television.
 
He'd seen it only a couple of times, and had been transfixed by the vague and fuzzy black and white pictures.

Castro had been heavily supported by the citizens of Santiago, and Marinda and Manuel had gone there a number of times for joyous celebrations.
 
Once Castro himself had been there and they had been close enough for the big man to recognize them.
 
He had singled them out and publicly praised them for their courage in bringing food to his men, taking care to say that many others had done so as well.

Manuel thought he would burst with pride.

Castro then said he was a communist, a term that meant little to either Marinda or Manuel.
 
Later, they both understood that it meant that they would get their fair share of the wealth hoarded by the rich and powerful families that had kept them in poverty.
 
Their hovel north of Guantanamo had a roof that leaked, packed dirt for their floor, and anywhere outside for a toilet, while the rich lived in mansions.
 
That was unfair and unjust.
 
Wealth should be shared equally.

They'd been puzzled when Castro had allied Cuba with Russia, a nation about which they knew very little, except that it was inhabited by white men who looked a lot like Americans.
 
Neither Manual nor Marinda had ever seen a Russian, but they were friends of Castro and, therefore, friends of Cuba.
 

Like many Cubans, they'd been outraged when the Americans had backed an invasion to the west, near Havana, at a place called the Bay of Pigs, and they'd rejoiced when the interlopers had been squashed.
 
Sadly, Manuel's father been killed fighting for the Revolution against the American and CIA backed thugs.
 
He was proclaimed a hero, but that didn't bring him back.