Chieftains (2 page)

TWO

The Field Headquarters of the 1st Battle Group, British 4th Armoured Division, were two Sultans, modified as command vehicles and situated almost a mile to the west and rear of the regiment's battle positions on the eastern slope of the Grosses Moor. The FV 105s, slab-sided and wedge-nosed, had only single 7.62 machine guns for armament and relied on the regiment's armour for protection. They were parked tight beneath the pine trees, the overhanging branches assisting the camouflage netting which draped the hulls. Two Chieftains were at rest nearby, one belonging to Lieutenant Colonel James Studley, the other to Major Fairly, the regimental second in command. A third command Sultan, normally used by the second in command and the operations officer, was sited eight kilometers to the rear with the Headquarters Squadron.

Between the Field Headquarters' Sultans and the regiment's forward armour were a company of mechanized infantry; to the rear, the battle group's two batteries of Abbot 105mm self-propelled guns. On the lower ground of the Elm, where it bordered the plain, six FV-438s fitted with launchers for the Swingfire ATGW missiles were concealed amongst a plantation of immature pines.

The interior of the commander's APC was crowded. Much of its available space was taken up by its two map boards and the radio equipment. Its small penthouse at the rear of the vehicle had been erected and gave a little more working room to the command staff, but even so it was almost impossible to move without jostling someone.

For the hundredth time in the past three hours, Lieutenant Colonel James Studley stared down at the large scale map in front of him, as though its constant detailed perusal might uncover some hidden aspect of the Soviet battle plans. His action was little more than nervous habit; he knew the area as intimately as the Sussex village where his family had lived since his childhood. Knowledge of the terrain was one of the strengths of the NATO armies.

He also knew the positions of the other battle groups of the armoured division. They were all part of the plan, carefully deliberated, debated and practised over all the past years, and soon to be tested. He understood its place in the overall scheme of the defence of Western Europe, although the fullest details remained, for obvious reasons of security, in the hands of the operations staff in Northern Army Group Headquarters.

Flexible defence! He thought it almost Buddhist in principle. Bend like a reed before a gale, against a strong attack give way; but with increasing force turn the enemy in the direction you choose. Lead him unsuspecting to the cunningly prepared traps, the killing zones. And the killing zone for CENTAG was Hannover.

Intelligence indicated that a major enemy thrust was likely to be made at the point where the areas of responsibility of the German and British corps overlapped. Secretly, Studley disagreed. If he were a Russian general, he would base his attack along the highway system from Magdeburg, knowing full well that the NATO powers could not fire a single shot in his direction until the spearhead of his heavy assault armour had crossed the border into their territory – by which time it would have gained too much momentum to be halted.

But no matter where the Russian assault came, the plan was to channel the main thrust south of the Örreler Heide and the densely forested areas to the north of Celle which had been tank training grounds for the German army since the days of the Third Reich Panzers. With even more mountainous terrain on their southern flank the Soviet forces would find themselves trapped in a narrowing funnel terminating at the city of Hannover. The inertia of the attack would be absorbed, diminished until it was lost completely. Assaults on towns and cities digested incalculable amounts of men and machines, which the long and harried lines of Soviet logistics would find difficult to maintain. Valuable time would be gained for NATO reinforcement. Already the Reforger airlift was in progress, bringing more troops and materials to Europe from the USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and many other sympathetic nations. Every hour counted, and the next seventy-two would be critical. The longer the Warsaw Pact countries delayed their attack, or the more effectively it could be contained when it began, the better the chances of NATO victory.

Three types of weapons which would surely influence the outcome of the initial battles were enigmatic to Colonel James Studley. He had studied their use, and knew their capability and dangers. They were chemical, biological and nuclear. There had been public outcry in the British Isles against the development of the chemical and biological weapons, but the work had gone ahead in the United States, and amongst the munitions now stockpiled in secret dumps throughout the whole of Europe were shells, bombs and missiles with biological, chemical and nuclear capabilities. In theory, at the moment, they were to serve only a retaliatory purpose should similar weapons be used against allied troops or civilians. But a certain tactical nuclear weapon already deployed by NATO was in a different catagory in Studley's opinion.

Nuclear tactical weapons existed in a number of various forms and strengths, from the diminutive depleted uranium shell, the American XM774, which although it had been designated 'nuclear' by international pressure had been developed for the sole purpose of the effective armour penetration of a single vehicle, to the 400 kt MGM-31A Pershings with their range of over five hundred miles and delivery speeds of Mach 8-plus at burn-out. In between the two were a variety of nuclear missiles, shells and mines, and it was these mines in particular that concerned Studley. He had learnt of them by accident, and the thought he found unpleasant was that they were controlled not by the men on the battlefronts, but by politicians perhaps three thousand miles away from the combat zone. The mines were pre-laid nuclear weapons sunk into strategic positions in West Germany, hidden lines of defence from north to south! Studley did not know their locations. Concealed in special chambers, below the depths where they could be exploded by any accidental method, they were the ugly monsters held in readiness for the protection of Western freedom. He could only guess at the power each of the mines might contain; it would be pointless for them to be small. They must be capable of taking out not just a regiment but perhaps a complete division, unless it were widely deployed, and they would have been laid in sufficient numbers to make one vast tactical nuclear strike effective against a complete enemy army in NATO territory.

The use of the weapons involved the terrible risk of triggering off a full-scale nuclear war against military and civilian targets alike. With much of its army totally destroyed along a complete front, the enemy would be faced with the acceptance of defeat and subsequent negotiation, or a retaliatory strike which would of necessity involve allied civilians and probable further nuclear attack by NATO long-range missiles deep into the enemy's own territory.

The nuclear mines disturbed Studley's thinking. He had been a soldier for many years, trained in the belief that war was the province of experienced fighting men, not of clerks or planners far away in hidden offices, or protected in bunkers or converted aircraft hundreds, of kilometers from the front lines. When he had first learned of the mines he had pictured a map of Europe on some distant planner's wall, the sites of the nuclear weapons lighting up as men received the latest information from the battlefields and pressed the appropriate buttons to arm the mines in the areas of the greatest enemy concentrations. At some point, they received a President's orders and turned their firing keys. Without warning to the troops on the battlefront, friend or enemy, the ground erupted with volcanic force and destruction beneath them.

But where, and when?

The West German government claimed to be committed to the policy of not losing even a single foot of land to the East. How far then would they permit an enemy to penetrate before the use of the nuclear mines was considered necessary...and who would make the decision? Was the critical depth of penetration a matter of centimeters, or beyond some planner's line drawn from Hamburg in the north, to Hannover, Kassel, Nürnburg in the south? Perhaps there was no such line! The mines might simply have been seeded at vital strategic points, and would be detonated if it appeared the enemy advance could no longer be resisted by conventional warfare. He was certain of only one thing...the weapons existed!

These unpleasant thoughts were disturbed by the radio operator. 'Division Headquarters, sir.'

He took a headset. 'Hello, this is Sunray, over.'

'This is Nine, Sunray. First chukka imminent. Troop movement sector Marigold. Full Red Alert. Over.'

'Sunray Wilco. Over.'

'Nine. Good luck, Sunray. Out.'

'Good luck!'. Studley repeated the HQ benediction automatically, and handed the headset back to the operator. First chukka imminent! Why in God's name did everyone assume all cavalry officers played polo? Chukka was a code word but it still meant that someone, somewhere, had thought it appropriate. Studley didn't approve of the British habit of using sporting analogies in war; war was too serious to be likened to a game even by a figure of speech. 'Philip...' He caught the attention of his adjutant.

The adjutant looked up from the code lists he had been examining. 'Sir.'

'Order the group to stand-by, and tell them I want full radio silence on the UHF nets. Remind the squadron leaders I don't want the men using energy-emitting equipment for the moment.' Soviet locators would undoubtedly be pinpointing any source of energy as possible targets for their artillery.

'Yes, sir.'

'And when you've done that, I'd like the command vehicle moved to the derelict barn at Primrose. Ask the sergeant major to see to the new command platoon positions, and then get someone to do a stag for you...you haven't slept for over twenty hours. Try to get some rest while you have a chance.'

The adjutant nodded. 'Thank you, sir.'

'So it's on, James.' Max Fairly, the second in command had been listening, and Studley found the familiarity of being addressed by his first name unexpectedly reassuring. Max was a close friend, an efficient but easygoing man whom Studley liked, and perhaps more important, trusted. Max was a little more heavily fleshed than when they had first met some years before, but he still kept himself fit with daily games of squash. He was forty-three years old, just a year younger than James Studley, and Studley knew Max, his wife Jane, and their son, well enough to feel he was part of their family – if only in the case of the boy, as a kind of well-liked adopted uncle. Unmarried himself, he had taught Max's son how to shoot and fish, and now the boy had become a grown man; they had spent a leave together only a month previously on one of the best trout beats of the Hampshire Itchen. Memories of the week had saddened Studley during the past hours. He had encouraged Max's son to choose a military career, and he was now a subaltern in a detachment of the Devon and Dorsets, trapped in West Berlin since the city had been sealed by East German forces two days previously.

'It sounds like it, Max. If anything is going to happen today, then it will probably begin in the next few minutes. HQ have reported movement in our sector.'

'I suppose we should thank God for ground radar and electronic sensors. At least we get some warning.' The activity within the command Sultans had increased as the men prepared to move. Fairly lowered his voice and stepped closer to Studley. 'You know, I never expected this to happen...a war.' He made a wry, half-amused smile. 'Playing soldiers for real, Jane would say.' He was watching Studley's face. 'Don't worry, James, I'm not going to hide under the bed with my hands over my ears! I just can't believe what's happening that's all. We talk about civilization, and then somehow ,allow this to develop.'

Max was thinking about his son, Studley realized. Jane's expression, 'playing soldiers for real', was the one she had used on the first occasion the boy had returned home in uniform. Although she made a joke about it at the time, her face had been strangely pale as though she had glimpsed her son's future. God, how could you defend Berlin? Leaving troops there in wartime was nothing more than human sacrifice on a political altar. They would make a good stand; the lads always did. But in the end it would be remembered as another Arnhem...a place of no retreat and no relief. He couldn't think of any suitable reply to his friend's words, so punched him lightly on the arm. 'Time you left us, Max, old lad.' The second in command should in fact have been at the rear of the battle group's positions, with the third of the command Sultans and the Headquarters Squadron. And James Studley knew his friend's request to be allowed to view the fire-points had been only an excuse for them to spend a couple of hours' together. 'Look after things back there.'

Max Fairly nodded, then smiled., 'Trust an Emperor's Chambermaid, James.'

Davis was apprehensive. Although it was claimed men could live for two weeks battened-down inside the hull of their Chieftain tank, breathing pure air through the NBC filter system, in practise he knew it wasn't that simple. Regardless of what they said, none of the tanks were completely air-tight and there was always the danger of seepage; the main gun, when it had been fired and was being reloaded, was just a hollow tube with one end out in the open air and the other inside the tank's fighting compartment. The crews had to expect to fight dressed in their NBC suits, hot, sticky, stinking and unpleasant. Like himself, most of the men would gamble comfort against their lives, and leave off their respirators until the last possible moment.