Patriot Dawn: The Resistance Rises (37 page)

As the aircraft
sat there with the engines ‘turning and burning’ the rear ramps lowered and a small security detachment ran off the back of each to secure the immediate area. The loadmasters walked down the ramp and gestured to the waiting chalks.

The four lines of families and fighters walked out towards the waiting aircraft carrying their gear, some of the wounded carried on stretchers. As they reached the ramps at the bac
k of the aircraft they felt the heat coming off the roaring engines, seemingly threatening to burn their faces as they waited for those ahead to get up the ramp.

Some of the kids and those who had never experience
d it were shielding their faces and turning away from the heat as the engine noise roared around them. Some of the younger kids were crying, scared by the noise, held by their moms.

The flight crew was directing them to fill into the red webbing seats that lined the outer skin of the aircraft and also a central island down the center. The rucksacks and wounded on stretchers were secured in the open
space by the back ramp, between the two side jump doors.

As soon as everyone was loaded, the ramps went up and the aircraft raced forwards one at a time, taking off over two thousand feet in the same direction that they had landed.

The C-130s lurched into the air and took off; banking sharply to the south and going straight back into nap of the earth flying at two hundred feet.

The constant low level flying over the hilly terrain, along the valle
ys and lurching over the ridges was rough. The passengers could feel the aircraft pulling G’s as they roared south. The aircrew went amongst them handing out sick bags to those who succumbed to airsickness and little boxes of juice drinks with straws to the kids.

Several hours later, they landed at Dallas Fort Worth. It was a definite culture shock. They emerged off the rear ramp straight from the Virginia woods, where they had been surviving at a basic level. They were met by air-conditioned coaches on the pan and driven to a large aircraft hangar, where there was power. Inside, they were met by a reception committee of Texas Guard dressed in the old style green BDU uniforms.

             
There was food and drink laid out, and a medical team waiting to help with the wounded. Jack was amazed at the forethought: they had it all set up in the large hangar, the medical tents off to the side, so that they did not have to separate anyone from the group, which may not have gone down so well with the close knit Virginians.

             
The senior officer present was a Colonel Bridges. Jack shook his hand and felt good about it. He seemed like a genuine stand-up guy. Colonel Bridges explained that they had set it up so that they would keep them in the hangar for OPSEC purposes, and to allow them to recover, clean up and decompress.

After that, they would make plans to integrate the Company with the Southern Federation forces, arranging for a place for the families to stay longer term.

Colonel Bridges did not bat an eyelid at the heavily armed and geared up Resistance fighters. He simply mentioned to Jack that they had built a weapons unloading bay at the entrance to the hangar and for safety reasons it would be best to clear the weapons for their stay. Jack agreed and passed the message.

They ended up spending a week decompressing in the hangar. With Megan’s agreement
and that of the families of those that had family with the group, some of the wounded were moved to a nearby hospital. Trust was developing easily and the group was starting to relax. The hangar had been divided up into male and female areas and there were rows of bunk beds laid out with bedding provided.

It appeared that Colonel Bridges was to be their main liaison go-to guy and he and Jack developed a good relationship.

There was a laundry service organized and in the meantime a bunch of military surplus and charity clothing was dumped off at the hangar, allowing the group to get on some clean clothes. The fighters found themselves outfitted in fresh green BDU uniforms, which led to a lot of joking about looking like smart real soldiers.

The Guard had brought in some mobile shower units, one male and one female, and everyone was able to get clean. It was luxury after being in the woods in the heat and humidity. They had also set up a projector in a corner of hangar along with a laptop and big selection of movies. The children spent a lot of time that week sitting about watching kid movies.

After the week, they were moved to the Double Tree hotel just down the road from the airfield. They had exclusive use of the hotel, there were no guests, and the hotel was running on generators. The staff was working and although the service was not the usual hotel standard, they ran a good buffet in the dining room. It was more of a makeshift barracks than a hotel, but to the Company and their families it was luxury.

The best thing about the hotel was the hot showers. Jack had a quiet word with Andrew and had him and Vicky take the kids away for a few hours, allowing him and Caitlin the free use of the hotel room. It had been a long time since they had been able to spend some quality alone time, and those few imitate hours were priceless.

Colonel Bridges was meeting with Jack every day and two days after the move to the hotel it became clear what they were going to be asked to do. It was time to pay the piper.

              “Jack,” said Colonel Bridges, “we have reviewed your report of the actions your Company participated in. We have seen the video footage of the battles. I have met your soldiers and spoken with many of them. They are excellent people, and you have all done a sterling job.”

“Thank you,” said Jack.

“It is also clear that amongst your command you also have a number of historically airborne qualified personnel.”

“True,” said Jack, thrown a curveball.

“Well, we want you guys for a high risk high reward airborne mission that we have in the pipeline.”

“Ok.”

“But I can’t tell you more until you are in isolation. We need to get you across to Fort Benning for parachute refresher training; we will isolate you there, and you will get the full mission brief.”

“Ok, but I need to make something clear.”

“What?”

“I will take all of my fighters, airborne qualified or not, if they want to go.”

Colonel Bridges grinned, “I thought you would say that. That’s fine, but just so you know; we only have enough ‘chutes for one practice jump.”

“Roger that.”

Jack got his Company together in the
conference room. He explained the situation and asked for volunteers. Everyone volunteered, including the three squads from the 82
nd
.

The next day, they said goodbye to their families and some of the wounded who were not medically cleared to go on the mission. They grabbed their gear, loaded onto the buses, and drove to the ai
rfield for the flight across to Fort Benning, Georgia.

             
For many of them, all the airborne qualified personnel and in particular the Rangers, it was a trip down memory lane. The base was now being run by Southern Federation troops and they had set up the jump school using the equipment that was still in place.

             
              They ran through a week of parachute school, compressing the course from the usual three week school into that one week. They pushed through ground ‘week’ and tower ‘week’ in the first five days and moved onto jump ‘week’ on the seventh day. It was a refresher for all of them, new for many of them.

It was certainly a strange sight to see them go through jump school, dressed in their ragtag of clothing despite the issue of the new green BDUs, and wearing beards and
unkempt hair. Some of them had trimmed and groomed themselves a bit, but not many. Jack grinned to think how this would have gone down in the super strict jump school of times past.

How priorities change.

              During the week, Jack was given top secret briefings that allowed him to begin to understand what they were up against. He had to keep the information close hold from the Company until they were in isolation following final jump qualification.

             
The Southern Federation believed that it was time to attack the Regime. They were planning a game of ‘kill the king’. It was a two part combined airborne and ground assault. The ground assault would break the Regime line in South Carolina and push north up the I-95 towards Washington DC. It was to be massive armored and mechanized push.

             
The preparatory operation would be a surprise airborne assault onto Washington DC, the Capitol itself, to attempt to cut the head off the snake. It was a high risk operation.

             
The idea was to use Jack’s Company as part of the airborne assault. If it failed for any reason, or the ground component did not make it to link up, then the thinking was that Jack’s fighters could lead the Southern Federation forces in a withdrawal out of DC back into the Virginia woods, to continue Resistance operations.

             
The planned drop zone (DZ) for Jack’s overhead assault mission was the Washington Mall itself, then rapidly assaulting onto the White House.

Jack had some input of his own on this plan. While serving with the Rangers, he had participated in an exchange with the British Parachute Regiment. Jack had been long dismayed with the direction that the US had gone with its parachuting capability.
He had some opinions that he would have liked to have seen implemented.

The classic T-10 parachute with its four second deployment count was being phased out for the T-11, with its six second count. All this meant that the direction the US military was taking was to jump from higher altitude, thus creating greater risk to the aircraft and the paratroopers.

When he had jumped with the Brits, they were using the ‘LLP’, or low level parachute, that deployed rapidly but had a slower rate of descent. It was regularly jumped in training at six hundred feet, and could be jumped in combat at two hundred and fifty feet, without a reserve parachute since there would not be time to deploy one.

In contrast, US military training jumps took place from altitudes around one thousand feet. Jack had also seen that the Brits had perfected the low level ‘overhead assault’ and had a simple system to rig for it. Knowing that he did
not have access to the LLPs, but that he was jumping into a potential hornets nest on the Mall, Jack asked for a jump height of four hundred feet using the older T-10 parachutes.

Jacks plan was approved and he implemented this into the training. For the final, single jump on the seventh day they would jump at four hundred feet. He also showed his Company how to rig for overhead assault.

Once they were wearing the parachute on their back, they used a piece of paracord tied to their rifle, like a sling. It was measured by holding the rifle out, almost like a bow, and pulling the paracord back to the elbow, almost like a bowstring.

Once the par
acord was rigged, they laid the weapon muzzle down behind their shoulder, resting against the parachute container, magazine rearwards. They then looped the center of the paracord under their arm and through the left upper D-ring attachment point for their reserve and clipped their reserve in place on their front.

The reserve held
the weapon in place by the paracord, with a further piece of paracord rigged as a quick release to tie the weapon muzzle down along their side. The idea was that once under canopy they could pull the quick release and raise the muzzle of the weapon up, thus getting it out of the way of their leg for landing, and once they unclipped the reserve the weapon would be immediately available to fight with.

They would jump wearing their tactical vests, and on landing they would simply pull the quick releases on
their shoulders to let the risers go, freeing them from the parachute canopy. This meant that there was no need to get out of the parachute harness itself, which they would leave on at least until a lull in the assault allowed them to remove it. It was all about being fast into action on the drop zone.

For their equipment, which would consist solely of
a daypack containing ammunition, water, communications equipment, spare batteries, night vision and an MRE, they would dispense with the usual equipment straps and lowering line. Usually the equipment container would be lowered on a fifteen foot line once under canopy. In this case, there was no time.

What Jack did was modify the way the daypack was rigged. It normally sat below the reserve on t
he jumpers thighs, let down on the fifteen foot line once under canopy by pulling on a release. They removed the release and simply had the daypacks attached to the lower D-rings on the harness, sitting on the jumpers thighs. Once on the ground, the jettison device alone would be used, releasing the daypack from the D-rings and allowing the jumper to extend the daypack straps and throw it on his back.

Keeping the daypack on the thighs would be uncomfortable for landing, but there would be no time under canopy from a four hundred feet jump height to mess about with lowering the container. The daypacks were not over heavy, not in the realm of one hundred and ten pounds which was the permissible weight for a full sized container. The jumper’s would just have to suck it up
and drive on; the priority was with the desire to jump low and be fast on the ground.