' The Longest Night ' & ' Crossing the Rubicon ': The Original Map Illustrated and Uncut Final Volume (Armageddon's Song) (39 page)

Nikki directed 04 away to recover at Canberra whilst she and Candy remained in company with the crippled aircraft.

Gerry contacted the aerodromes tower but kept the gear up, even when the breakers at the cliffs base came into view out of the darkness.

Nikki kept the Tomcat on his wing even though the treetops seemed close enough to touch. The F-14 was nose high, its variable geometry wings fully forward at 20° and flaps at 35° to keep pace with the Australian aircraft.

Jervis Bay aerodrome was barely discernable ahead of them. The flare path was lit but at low power, giving the minimum assistance required for the pilot to land. An ambulance and fire truck’s stood ready; although no emergency lights flashed they sat with engines idling and only the vehicle sidelights on.

The aircraft cleared the trees a half mile from the perimeter where the land gave way to low gorse and scrub. There was now nothing between them and the tarmac except a ragged hedge running across the end of the aerodrome. Gerry dropped the gear, struggling to keep a stall at bay and the wings level.

Nikki applied power, drawing away as the F-111C crossed the threshold.

Candy was twisted around and peering back, she saw the aircraft bounce before racing along the tarmac for a few yards, and then the gear collapsed. Australia’s last F-111C slammed onto runway, skidding along on its belly and raising sparks that ignited the leaking fuel.

“NO!”

The cry came not from Candy but from Nikki when the night cloaked aerodrome and surrounding area were suddenly revealed to her as ‘
Belly Dancer
01’s’ fuel tanks behind the crew capsule exploded, and the stricken aircraft disintegrated in a ball of fire on the runway.

The Tomcat banked left with its pilot informing the tower she was entering the pattern for Three Three, the second runway. Lt (jg) LaRue half expected them to be diverted to Canberra but they got their clearance.

Barely had the aircraft rolled to a halt and shut down when Nikki left the aircraft without assistance, removing her helmet and unbuckling, dropping to the ground and sprinting away towards the crash site.

The aircraft had been completely destroyed, the scattered wreckage burning furiously. Beyond the crash, in the light of the flames, she saw a stretcher being hurriedly loaded aboard the ambulance and she shouted for it to wait but it drove away rapidly, leaving her beside the runway, panting for breath. Helplessly she watched it depart and then turned back to the burning wreckage, the firelight revealing to her for the first time the collapsed parachutes and ejection capsule sat on the grass on the far side of the tarmac with Flt Lt Gerry Rich beside it being examined by a medic.

She forced herself to walk across to him.

“That was quite a run.” he said. “And anyone but me might think you cared.”

Nikki did not respond to the remark but instead looked towards the flying club, just barely visible beside the hangars.

“Did someone say something about there being a bar here?” she nodded apologetically to the medic because he had not finished and she was just getting started.

“Are all his bits and pieces still intact? I know he doesn’t have much use for his head but it’s not going to fall off and roll away somewhere is it?”

“No Ma’am, but the aches and pains of ejection will start to tell in the next few hours.”

“Thank you.”

Taking Flt Lt Rich by the arm fairly forcefully she marched across the field to the clubhouse where sure enough there were a bunch rubbernecking regulars at the doorway, drinks in hand watching the action on the runway.

“Gangway…make a hole…officer coming through.” Nikki arrived at the bar with a hundred dollar note.

“Four fingers of Tequila, twice, and ten dollars in change…and where is the Ladies Room?”

As the drinks were poured Gerry watched in a kind of bemused wonder as the American aviator palmed the change and disappeared briefly into the women’s washroom before reappearing, muttering about Aussies not knowing what century this was. 

Nikki’s next stop, the men’s room, was marked by a hurried exit by a regular, still doing his pants up. When she reappeared Gerry was still stood staring in wonder.

In one go, Nikki downed the glass of spirits and glared accusingly at Gerry until he did the same.

“Now, come with me.”

He did not really have an option as she again proceeded with purpose, holding onto his arm and led him out of the club house and around the back of the hangar. Once there she pressed something into the palm of his hand.

“There was only one left, so make it count.” She began to hurriedly unzip her G-suit as she leant against the hangar wall.

There was enough light left from the fire for him to see the print on the packaging beneath the cellophane.

‘Ribbed for her pleasure.’

It only took a moment to sink in before Gerry Rich was also hurriedly unzipping.

Port Kembl
a.

Dawn.

With the air and naval attacks defeated the invasion fleet divided, the southern group splitting to sail directly to Bateman’s Bay and Moruya. The bombarding of the beaches and defences went on in earnest before the landings began at Moruya. The general opinion was that the Moruya landings were a diversion, and one easily contained on the two highways that cut through the forest and hills between Bateman’s Bay and the beaches at Moruya.

At Port Kembla though it was a major effort to seize the port and the town, and the defences were being pounded by rocket and naval gunfire.

Heck and the small combat team had left the harbour area below the escarpment once the invasions fleet’s course change and formation had been detected. This had been expected for several days, and the only mystery was why it had taken the Sino-Russian fleet so long to act. The Challengers and Warriors then occupied the positions they had prepared at the rear of 902
nd
Infantry, and waited.

Despite the Allied victory in Europe, the defenders in Australia were not that much better off. The NATO forces in Europe had suffered near defeat and a frightful attrition, but there were two British, two French and one German Brigade afloat and an airlift was bringing infantry in the light role to Australia’s shores. However, no combat aircraft had arrived from either the USA or Europe and the media in Australia had just begun to ask why.

Fortunately, for the moment, the enemy air forces were absent, but from the combat teams location they could see the 902
nd
receiving a hellish bombardment.

Heck would not have occupied those forward positions until landing craft were sighted, had he been the American CO of course. There was plenty of other better cover, and close enough to the beach for rapid movement between the two.

Heck had listened incredulously on the battalion net as the 902’s CO reacted to the losses of two of his company CPs, by ordering Captain Briant Foulness  to bring his Black Horse Cavalry M1A1’s into the forward fighting positions to
‘‘Take the heat off the naval bombardment’’
. Two hours later and the PLAN were moving ashore in the face of uncoordinated and greatly weakened defending forces.

Lack of a flexible plan and fall-back options had resulted in crippling losses, during which the CO had suddenly become unresponsive. A fighting withdrawal had begun, and with no orders from Lt Col Taylor all morning Heck had coordinated with Briant, covering the Americans with the Challengers extra-long reaching L30A1 120mm rifled gun.

Six of the Abrams MBTs were still serviceable, one had been destroyed by a direct hit from a naval shell, and two had been recovered under fire by the tank company’s own M88A2 Hercules and Sgt Rebecca Hemmings CRARRV, towing the vehicles to the rear. A further Abrams was seriously damaged by a hit to the engine deck that immobilised the tank, although the crew fought on until ordered to abandon the vehicle and destroy it.   

Heck peered through the sights at the top of the grassy bank before Minnamurra beach where it bordered Kilalea State Park. A Chinese Type 63 amphibious tank had been sat there burning until a few minutes before, blocking the exit off the beach at that point. Heck’s tank had killed it with a HESH round, its armour too thin to require a sabot round. The hatches had blown off and the Warrior fighting vehicles had killed or wounded the crew as they had bailed out, the Rarden cannons accounting for them all. That had been their first round fired in anger during this war, although the crew had all seen service during the invasion of Iraq and its aftermath.

Minnamurra Beach was hedged in by water as it was a long tapering tail with the Minnamurra River at its rear. The far bank of the river was lined by a sea wall for much of its length. The quickest way inland was via Kilalea, into the right flank of the 902
nd
Infantry Regiment, but the Royal Tank Regiment Challengers 2s were covering the 902’s withdrawal with highly accurate long distance fire.  After the first amphibious tank had been knocked out a second had tried to bulldoze it out of the way, exposing its thin belly armour as it rose up out of the dead ground beyond the bank. That effort had seen a predictable ending, a HESH hit on the belly had set off the onboard munitions and it had blown up, the turret flying off as if it were made of cardboard, not steel. The enemy’s next attempt to clear the exit had been to attach tow cable and drag the hulks away one at a time. As Heck watched there was a rush of infantry up over the bank and towards the tanks firing position. The Royal Green Jacket’s snipers killed the leaders and the Warriors engaged the remainder with their 30mm cannons.

“Sunray Tango One One, this is Yankee Four Six…everyone that could get off the headland and Shellharbour beach have done so.”

“Sunray Tango One One roger, roger out to you…hello Sunray India Three One, move now over!”

The Royal Green Jackets reversed out of their positions, heading away to join the Bradleys, SPs, M125s and a clutch of support vehicles that had been to the rear.

The Black Horse tank company had covered the left flank as the two infantry companies withdrew off the Bass Point headland in their Bradley fighting vehicles, those that were still able of course. More of the Bradley’s fighting positions contained burning vehicles than those that did not. The enemy had walked their gunfire back and forth over the headland for over an hour before beginning their landings. There was a lot to be said for playing the shell game as a defender, by preparing several sets of alternative fighting positions including dummy ones, but Lt Colonel Taylor had at best used one cup instead of three, and a glass bottom one at that.

The Abrams, Challengers, Warriors and eleven Bradley AFVs, six M125 and the 902’s battery of 155mm SP Paladin
guns seemed to be the only survivors, but there had to be others, surely?

The Type 98 that next roared up the exit ramp had been delivered to the beach by landing craft. It was a main battle tank with ERA plates like scaly armour covering it but it fared no better. Tango One One Charlie and Delta had been waiting patiently with sabots loaded and fingers on the trigger for anything heavier than a Type 63 to stick its head over the parapet. Both Challengers fired in the same instant and the Chinese stopped dead in its tracks at the top of the ramp and began to burn, no one got out.

The Challenger troop withdrew in pairs, covering one another and joined up with a waiting platoon of M1A1s.

They were hard pressed by Type 63 light tanks that had come ashore nearer Shellharbour where the beach had been defended by only the dead. Although the Chinese tanks 85mm guns lacked the single shot kill ability when engaging the American and British tanks, the same was not true for the guns effect on IFVs such as Warriors and Bradleys. The seven MBT’s fought as a rearguard in terrain that for now did not favour their main tank guns greater killing range.

They fell back from Kilalea into the affluent suburb of Shell Cove. The residents had departed but their homes lay in ruins, shattered by rocket artillery and naval gunfire, whole streets were ablaze.

The tanks leapfrogged back, using fire and manoeuvre to cover each other and the lighter armed IFV’s as they withdrew to the combat team’s next position.

Thick smoke from the burning residences meant that the thermal sights had to be engaged, but that did not prevent the Challenger from colliding with a parked car. Abandoned by their owners in favour of something more practical, the his and hers vanity rides, a yellow Porsche 911 for her and a silver one for him were parked bumper to bumper in the street where they had been damaged by shrapnel, and the paintwork was blistered in places. An expensive repair job, but doable. Tango One One’s left rear track raised only a little as it met the front end of the silver sports car. First one and then the other were crushed beneath the left hand track of the reversing MBT. About the only thing salvageable were the car alarms that continued an almost outraged blaring as the armour disappeared into the smoke.

“This is Yankee Four Six, step on it guys, the streets either side of you have armor trying to get ahead of you and take you from the rear!”
Braint Foulness had been re-joining with the remaining forces with the majority of his company. They now stopped as the flanking movement became apparent in their thermal sights.