Power Games: Operation Enduring Unity I (20 page)

5 March: 1420

By modern standards, First Brigade stuck together like a phalanx down I-75. They left most of the cumbersome support train back at FOB Lake City, but even this “light” force still consisted of over 500 tracked and wheeled vehicles loaded with more than 2,000 men. All rolling down a single interstate. The convoy sprawled out easily five miles, even when taking up both north and southbound lanes and the median. Sometimes less than four miles spacing, if the lead elements were forced to stop.

Which happened practically every other mile. One ragtag militia group or another tried blocking the way or sniped from the side of the road. Quick problems to deal with, but they paused the entire advance each time. Though not all at once. When the lead elements suddenly halted the column to clear whatever ineffective resistance the militias threw up the rear kept going. They were too far back to even hear the firing ahead. This miles-long accordion effect was as dangerous as it was hilarious.

The danger didn’t come from the constant hit and run attacks. Only one soldier had been slightly wounded in nearly two hours of stop and go fighting. Whereas the Feds recovered dozens of militia bodies. They might not be able to pin the enemy down into a big standup fight, but at the rate they were bleeding them dry, there wouldn’t be anyone left to fight in Orlando.

Not that the Army hadn’t swooped up a surprising number of prisoners, but that only slowed them down further. It sure didn’t provide much useful intelligence. Some of these combatants weren’t even from Florida. Much less have a clue where the FDF main body lurked. A few didn’t even know they were firing at federal forces; thought they were rebels. What a clusterfuck.

First Brigade learned a hard lesson from the Second and Third Brigades’ messes. They wouldn’t scatter themselves in small units across half the state. No, far better to stay a giant armored steamroller flattening anything that dared to get in the way. A ferocious, invincible desert tan camouflaged can of whoopass just waiting to be opened.

Their aircraft above finally reported something of real intelligence value. Florida’s only fully professional brigade wasn’t 60 miles farther south racing to get to Gainesville ahead of the Feds. Apparently they were already inside and waiting. The Fed commander relaxed at the news. He was never pleased with the great plan of merely pinning down the enemy. His force had the edge and he ached to use it. Their brigade was larger, armed with the latest equipment and their men better trained. Unfortunately, for the government troops, the rebels knew a few ways to exploit a compacted target. Terrible ways that do wonders at leveling the odds.

The fighting died down on the outskirts of Gainesville. This far south, well outside the carefully defined “battle zone” the police evacuated, large crowds lined the streets to enjoy the show. Some waved signs welcoming the Army and others suggested less pleasant ideas. The random sign plugged some local fast food joint or end of the world religious message. Quite a few people brought picnic blankets and beer coolers.

All and all, it seemed like a pretty normal Fourth of July parade. Except that these weren’t ageing Korean and Vietnam era vets. The alert and fit young men, reeking of oil and gun smoke, were better suited to a movie than a small town patriotic fair. That’s what attracted the crowds in the first place. That’s also what disappointed them when nothing happened.

Then, exactly like a film, the “building context” lull in the story ended and the action began. It was sad, but not surprising, that those civilians with the best view of the show were the first to die. Had a live observer guided the strike, and seen all those bystanders, then the whole thing likely would have been called off.

Fortunately, for the FNG, but unfortunately for the civilians, the mission had been preplanned on a map. No chance to stop the inevitable. Half a minute earlier and 20 miles deeper south, a battalion of rebel HIMARS artillery rippled off their entire arsenal of 108 GPS-guided rockets. Each of these telephone poles carried 404
DPICM
sub munitions.

The computer controlled distribution pattern ensured almost all of the 40,577 bomblets blanketed a front only 100 yards wide and nearly four miles deep. Even after the 7% dud rate, which was twice as high as the supplier claimed, one bomb still exploded every five square yards.

Each little cylinder contained an embedded shaped charge warhead. When it struck the thin roof of a vehicle, the small bomb detonated in a fashion that sent 65% of its explosive energy in a narrow downward cone straight into the engine compartment, or as was too often the case, the packed crew compartment. If one failed to strike a vehicle and hit open pavement or grass instead, the devil’s firecracker bounced back up to waist height before exploding, sending shrapnel in all directions.

For those civilians either fortunate or foresighted enough to watch from a safe distance, the entire column disappeared in a never-ending popcorn string of explosions and smoke. Witnessing such a large force seemingly annihilated in seconds was so far beyond their level of comprehension as to be biblical. Most simply fled as fast they could.

Explosions tend to pump out huge clouds of smoke several times larger in diameter than the blast itself. Hence, the perceived devastation is always so much worse than the reality. As the wind cleaned the air a bit, it was clear that the majority of the unit survived in good shape. The soldiers might have been shaken, but drill and discipline stood in for morale well enough. A quarter of the unit just died or were seriously wounded. A third of their vehicles were now smoldering hulks or at least immobilized, but the brigade reacted as if this happened all the time. That discipline prevented complete annihilation.

Lining up in column formation might be the quickest way to move a large force around, but it’s the worst way for a large force to fight. As the FNG advanced in a long crescent, most of their weapons could concentrate on just the tiny forward section of the enemy’s Conga line. Conversely, only a fraction of the other federal fighting power could hit back at any given time. Whether an ancient Greek phalanx or a modern armored force, that was a wet dream for one side and a horror for the other.

The Florida brigade slowly encircling and devastating them was primarily a Guard force, but they were backed up by a single Minutemen armor company. Working side by side with the active duty guys motivated these ex-military types. Earning the respect of your peers is as great an inspiration in the heat of battle as patriotism.

The rebel track commander grinned like a wolf as his swift loader shouted “Up!” and his skilled gunner hollered “away” barely a second later. They were a damn good team already. Less than five seconds after he ID’d their slow moving Fed counterpart as a target, his boys sent a sabot round on its way.

And what a way it went. Almost as soon as the shell blasted out the 120mm barrel the round split apart. The plastic sabot shoe allowing it to fit inside the big gun spun off and left only a tiny depleted uranium penetrator hurtling towards some tan spec in the distance. That little rod aiming to kill a hulking main battle tank was barely an inch in diameter and 31 in length. In this case, size really didn’t matter.

Kinetic energy, or killing power, is a result of mass times velocity squared. With the smallest possible surface area to reduce friction and molded from the densest alloys known to man, this was the most advanced spear imaginable. Thousands of years of chemistry and physics focused on improving the human lot were on terrible display in this “silver bullet.”

The tank’s expensive fire control computer augmented the gunner’s skill. His shot led the target vehicle perfectly. The thin penetrator struck the crawling enemy Abrams over 2,000 yards away dead center in the side of the turret…at 5,700 feet per second. At that speed, the kinetic energy easily dwarfed the explosive warhead of an anti-tank missile. By the time the non-explosive shell worked its way through the tank’s nearly 18 inches of laminated armor and breached the crew compartment the rod was coming apart. Which was fine, since the kill had already been made.

The dart didn’t just disintegrate into ordinary shrapnel. Heated depleted uranium burns when exposed to oxygen, much like magnesium. Essentially napalmed shrapnel. As if that wasn’t nasty enough, hundreds of white-hot shards from the tank’s armor also shot inside as well. The interior anti-spalling Kevlar lining helped keep all these burning splinters from ricocheting…but only after they ripped through flesh and bone.

The driver, alone in a separate sealed compartment, made it out without a scratch on him. Instead of running from the burning track, as normal people would do, he did what a soldier does. He clambered onto the smoking turret, tore open a hot hatch and hauled the barely breathing loader out.

As an extra safety design feature, the Abram’s cannon rounds are stored in a separate compartment at the rear of the turret. In the event of an explosion, the compartment was designed to funnel the blast up and away from the vehicle and crew. A useful feature…if you’re inside. The driver had just dragged his buddy out the hatch when the fire reached the ammo closet and the world ended under his feet.

Above them, a company of six armored
Apache
gunships, each dangling 16 Hellfire missiles and packing 30mm automatic cannons, picked their targets from the rebel smorgasbord. Time to level the playing field. The crews didn’t know they themselves were targets until three disintegrated in a blaze of glory. The rest scattered and would be recalled back to base without ever firing a shot.

Even higher up, a pair of Florida Reserve F-16’s, equipped with their cutting-edge look down, shoot down radars rippled off Sidewinder missiles at the defenseless helicopters below. The choppers weren’t their primary mission. They slaughtered the Apaches en passé, without even deviating from their assigned objectives. These $18 million ultra-advanced, Terminator-style frightful killing machines were simply “targets of opportunity” to the enemy’s air force. Casually swatted out of the skies like so many mosquitoes.

5 March: 1430

Across several hundred square miles of sky above, dozens of federal and National Guard aircraft duked it out for air superiority. More streaked in low and fast, each trying to drop several tons of high-tech, high-explosive ordinance on the poor damn ants below. Florida’s surprisingly large and advanced network of ground based anti-aircraft weapons also began showing its full strength.

To make matters worse, in order to limit unnecessary losses, the Air Force’s protective screen of fighter aircraft had long since been scaled back to a bare minimum. It seemed a logical precaution, since all of Florida’s combat aircraft were successfully neutralized in the opening air strikes.

The first sign that the Feds’ intelligence was less than accurate were several volleys of long-range AMRAAM missiles slamming into their scattered Combat Air Patrols. Apparently, the enemy dispersed their aircraft far better than expected. The rebel’s victory wasn’t cheap, but presently the Guard’s surviving F-15’s secured local air supremacy. It might be short lived, since more Fed fighters were scrambling from Georgia and even some of the recently “liberated” air bases in Florida, but the next hour would be hell on the defenseless federal soldiers below.

For the first time since World War II, a large American ground force lay naked to enemy aerial bombardment without a single friendly fighter around. They didn’t even have much in the way of anti-aircraft weapons, since most of the division’s air defense assets were busy fighting for their lives up north. The rebels made the best use of this short-term advantage despite their limited resources.

This aerial counterattack involved more than just the Reserve squadron of F-16’s dropping cluster munitions on any clump of vehicles they could find. It was even more intense than the battalion of AH-64’s fanning out into pairs and providing direct fire support to units in contact. General Cooper, whether from luck or an uncanny feeling of the battle, shoved everything that could fly into the fight at the exact moment the enemy’s advance ran low on steam.

One slightly modified Florida C-130 even tried its hand at carpet-bombing. Unfortunately for everyone concerned, they were never given an opportunity to practice the mission beforehand. All 40 five hundred pound, unguided bombs rolled off the transport’s back ramp at far too high an altitude. They did nearly as much damage to the retreating guardsmen as to the federal infantry battalion close on their heels. Still, the shock value of encountering a threat not seen in generations threw the Army, to put it mildly, off stride.

What started out as a vast race had long since devolved into a grinding, running slugfest. After the shocks from the air, even that trickle of momentum faded fast. General McDowell’s grand plan was shattered as hopelessly as the morale of his scattered soldiers.

It is difficult to envisage the vast space modern mechanized battles take place in. Between elaborate communications systems and endless numbers of fast vehicles, small units today can effectively cover an area so large that one platoon could not even hear the shots of their brother platoon.

A single brigade in the Civil War might’ve barely occupied a mile long front when deployed for battle. Even unopposed, they’d be lucky to march 20 miles a day. This 21
st
century version here in Florida effortlessly strung themselves out over 50 square miles and advanced in just half an hour over what their ancestors covered in a day. The flipside to this breathtaking capability is the short reaction time leaders have to avert disasters.

While the astonished command staff up in Lake City hastily reconciled this surreal turn of events with their fantasies and tried to whip up a new plan on the fly, things only got worse. The more the situation worsened, the narrower their tunnel vision became. From general to lowest clerk, their attention was fully tuned to untangling the forward units and bringing their exposed support assets under the air defense umbrella at FOB Lake City.

The Air Force’s steady warnings about a significant militia force advancing from the east towards that same logistics center and their own command post weren’t taken too seriously. Only with the enemy minutes from town did anyone react. Finally, the division’s command staff absentmindedly deployed their only reserve battalion to screen their exposed flank and deal with this nuisance while the big brains focused on the “real war.”