Operation: Archangel

Chapter 13

Hakodate
Z-day + 2983
D-Day+48
23:47

In the pitch darkness of the midnight Hokkaido shore, a small fishing boat bobbed gently in the water as the surf pushed it ashore.

To the naked eye it appeared to be abandoned, just one of a million such boats that had been set adrift over the years, either from a storm causing it to slip its harbor moorings and blowing it out to sea, or ran out of fuel from carrying panicked survivors out to the supposed safety of the sea.

However, this boat was not as innocent as it seemed.

As the tide finally pushed it into the sand banks, a quartet of camouflage clad figures disembarked and made their way up the beach. They moved quickly and silently, careful only to step within the lead man's boot prints to disguise their numbers. They only paused briefly at the sea wall to boost each over the twelve-foot-high wall before they continued on, not stopping until they'd cleared the line of abandoned sea front houses and made their way into the cover of the fields and wood blocks behind.

The patrol spread out into an all-round defense, interlocking their legs with Tigger crouched in the middle. Satisfied they were undetected, he pressed his ear radio comms.

"Zero, this is Bravo Seven One, we're feet dry on position Alpha. Will hold till H-hour then proceed to Objective Pegasus. Out."

H-hour was 00:15 hours, at which time, the land stage of Operation: Kraken Strike would commence.

Following the Spetsnaz raid on Camp Wellington, any and all chance of a peaceful negotiation with the Pan-Asian Naval Alliance had evaporated. The remaining British and Japanese commanders agreed that the threat the alliance posed could not be ignored, and was to be removed by force. Operation: Kraken, was designed to remove the threat in a single, devastating strike. The plan consisted of two stages: a stealth insertion under the codename 'Operation: Kraken', and an amphibious assault, codenamed 'Operation: Strike.'

Operation: Kraken consisted of two, simultaneous covert strikes designed to remove the two main threats to the amphibious landings. Namely the airbase at Hakodate Airport, and the warships in Hakodate harbor.

Following the Spetsnaz raid, almost the entirety of the taskforce's fixed wing air support had been destroyed on the ground, so much so that there were too few fighter and strike aircraft remaining to guarantee air superiority over the landing forces. So when satellite recon had spotted almost an entire squadron's worth of MiG-29 fighter jets and SU-25 bombers stationed at Hakodate Airport, it was necessary to eliminate them.

The job was given to the SAS, who, as well as Tigger's Bravo Seven troop, had committed two other troops to the operation. They were too infiltrate ashore and remove the threat of the aircraft as well destroying troop specific targets; Bravo Five would attack the fuel depot, Bravo-Six the radar station, and Bravo Seven the pilot's barracks.

While the SAS were busying themselves with the airfield, their naval cousins; the SBS, would be seeing about the warships in the harbor. Deploying from HMS Ambush, which was lurking somewhere offshore, the combat divers would swim into the harbor and plant limpet mines on the underside of every warship and submarine in the harbor. At 01:00, or if manually detonated early, the mines would sink every ship in the harbor before they could fire a shot.

Tigger guessed the divers were already hard at work. Despite their inter-service rivalry, he doffed his hat to them. Combat diving was a dangerous business, even by special forces standards. He wouldn't do it given the choice.

Once they'd finished with the airfield, the SAS had secondary targets to hit; local garrisons, missile batteries, infrastructure targets etc. But if they couldn't, HMS Ambush, as well as several Royal Artillery Ground Multiple Launch Rocket System (GMLRS) concealed in Oma on the other side of the straights, were tasked to destroy them with pinpoint Tomahawk and Surface to Surface missile strikes.

Once all targets were neutralized, Operation: Strike would begin. An all-out combined arms attack by the British Army, Royal Marines, and SDF would hit three beaches around Hakodate, codenamed Nodachi, Katana, and Tanto with the end of day objectives for each beach being the Government Offices, Army National Guard training base, and Hakodate airport respectively. With any luck, by day's end, they'd have eliminated the Pan-Asian alliance's ability to strike at the task force, and have a foothold on Hokkaido.

But as every soldier in every age had been taught from day one of basic training; no plan survives contact with the enemy.

As his watch read 00:15, Tigger shifted his rifle to a low ready and whispered to his team.

"That's H-hour. Let's do it."

Bravo Seven did not reply vocally, they simply stood one by one and continued towards the airfield.

It didn't take them long to reach the airfield, stalking their way through the surrounding forest and undergrowth until they came to the treeline. Five meters on stood a three-meter chain link fence topped with rolls of barbed wire. Beyond that were the distant shapes of strike aircraft, hangers, and ancillary buildings, like strange prehistoric creatures in an alien land.

The perimeter was surprisingly lightly guarded for a military base that had just attacked another power. Had it been a British base, there would have been watch towers, search lights, constant patrols, dogs, camera's, maybe even a layered mine field. Doubtless, there were some defenses, but by now the guards would be tired, relaxed, and not expecting an attack in the dead of night.

As Tigger, Rika and Oz covered, Coppers moved forwards and started cutting a hole in the wire with a small pair of wire cutters. As Coppers worked, he couldn't help but smile. He was deadly focused on the task, and he would soon be gutting this airfield and its occupants like a pig at slaughter. But despite himself, Coppers couldn't help but feel he that he was following the footsteps of his great grandfather.

Corporal David Gallagher, had been one of the founding members of 'L detachment', the group that would, under the legendary David Sterling, become the SAS. He had been there during their first disastrous operations against the Germans, been there when they'd joined forces with the long range desert group and started raiding Luftwaffe airfields from heavily armed jeeps. And while he wasn't manning a K-gun and mowing down German infantry… Coppers could feel his grandfather smiling down upon him.

He snapped the last link of wire and removed the cut segment before crawling through on his belly. "Clear, we're in."

The other operators crawled through the wire and stalked across the field towards the waiting buildings and aircraft. This was when they were most vulnerable, when it could all go to hell in a hand basket. All it would take was one half awake guard with a scope or searchlight to spot the slightest bit of black on black movement in the darkness and raise the alarm.

Fortunately, it seemed luck was on their side. No alarms were raised, and they reached the relative safety of the shadow of the first jet in a line of waiting aircraft, undetected. Silently they went to work, setting charges of C4 with remote detonators, placing a charge in different places in each jet on the line; in fuel lines, engine intakes, exhausts, landing gear bays.

It took the roughly twenty minutes to do the work, but they'd all carried in explosives and had enough to go around. As Oz and Rika set to wiring the MiG in the line, Tigger moved to their secondary, more personal objective. He turned to Rika and Oz and handed the latter the detonator.

"You two finish wiring the jet then get back to the RV. Blow the jets on time whether we're back or not. Coppers, with me."

Rather than argue with the seasoned officer, Oz and Rika just nodded, returning to their work as Tigger and Coppers headed off towards the nearby barracks buildings.

The duo crept along the edge of one of the buildings; a prefab building the type of which were unique to military bases the world over, crouched low underneath the windows.

"Sir, this is officer country," Coppers pointed out, his voice just above a whisper so only Tigger would hear him and those inside would not over the sound of their own conversations and music.

"I know," Tigger replied, as they came to the edge of the building. It was just one in a line of prefabs, but going by the hand painted squadron insignia on the door, this was one of the few which housed pilots.

Tigger slung his C8 and drew his Sig, threading its suppressor over the muzzle. He glanced at his watch, six minutes till the bombs went off across the base. He turned to Coppers.

"Fresh mag?" He whispered. Coppers nodded.

After a cursory glance around to check that the coast was clear, Tigger stood from the shadows and, as if he were walking into his own home, stepped into the barracks room with Coppers just behind.

Inside were around a dozen pilots. Mainly Russian but a few Chinese dotted among them, the air thick with the smell and cigar smoke of Tabaco. Some were on their bunks reading or sleeping, one was playing on an antiquated Gameboy, but most were gathered around a table towards the back, midway through a round of poker.

Initially, they didn't notice the new comers, until one looked up and paled at the sight of two fully kitted operators standing at the other end of the bunk house. The room went deathly quiet as they all looked at the Brits. Tigger cracked an evil smile.

"Good evening," He said quietly.

Without warning, Tigger raised his Sig and shot the closest pilot through the head with a dull thwack. The body hadn't yet hit the floor when he switched targets and shot the gamer twice through the heart, sending him tumbling over backward as Coppers opened up on the poker came on full auto. Some of the pilots tried to dive for cover or reach for weapons, but none made it out of their holsters before being punctured by hollow point rounds to the sound of dull wet thumps.

The slide on Tigger's Sig locked back as he expended the last round in his magazine and Copper's ceased fire. They looked around the room; the smell and smoke of cordite mixed with the haze of Tabaco and nothing moved except some brass casings rolling on the vinyl coated floor. Tigger released his Sig's magazine, letting it clatter to the floor before replacing it with a fresh one, releasing the slide forwards while Coppers swapped out his depleted mag for a fresh one.

"Alright, let's go," Tigger said, having had enough of the blood bath he'd just caused. He and Coppers left without another word. They had only minutes to get across the base before the bombs went off.

Once they made it past the Jets they broke into a sprint, trading stealth for speed as they rushed across the open ground. A search light bathed them in white light for a second, blinding them for a moment before it ceased as the suppressed supersonic crack rolled across the field. More lights winked on. They could hear distant shouting from behind them as the two kept running, expecting to be shot by snipers as they practically dove back through the hole they'd made.

They retreated a few meters into the treeline and found Oz and Rika waiting for them. Rika was prone behind her PSG, while Oz was waiting, C8 in one hand and his eye's darting between the field and his watch.

"Time?" Tigger asked, slightly short on breath from the full kit half a kilometer sprint he and Coppers had just done.

"30 Seconds," Oz replied, before offering Tigger the detonator. "You want the honors?"

Tigger nodded and excepted the detonator, eyes now glued to his watch.

Never before had thirty seconds seemed like such a long time. People were beginning to run around, distant shouting could be heard as the guard's found the bodies of the pilots and rushed to find the intruders.

As his watch passed 00:45:00, Tigger clicked the detonator.

For a second nothing happened. The horrible thought of the detonators having failed just began to rear its head before a great orange fireball erupted, engulfing the first jet as a second and third detonation thundered, signaling the end of the fuel depot and radar station and accrediting Bravo's five and six's handiwork.

Bravo Seven all cracked a smile as they watched the fireballs engulf the jets, turning the once proud aircraft into nothing but warped scrap metal and bonfires.

"Beautiful Ain't it?" Coppers commented as another jet exploded. "Someone should take a picture."

"No time mate, we're off," Tigger said. They'd already overstayed, they would be hunted now, they needed to be gone before the search parties found their infill point and picked up their trail.

And as silently as they had come, Bravo Seven disappeared into the night, then only voice being Tigger reporting on the radio.

"Bravo Seven reporting, all Objective Pegasus targets destroyed. Moving to secondary targets. Out."

...

On approach to Landing Beach Katana
Z-day + 2984
D-Day+49
05:40

Huddled in the packed troop bay of a Landing Craft Vehicle Personnel MK 5, Captain Griffin checked his L85 assault rifle over one last time. Ejecting and checking the top round in the magazine for deformities before replacing it with a satisfying click, all while listening to the mission update coming over the battle net.

"Charlie-Four-Two-Zero. Acknowledged. WILCO, out," He spoke into his radio before rising to his feet, grasping the overhead hand holds to steady himself as the landing craft forced its way through the buffeting seas.

"Lads! Listen in!" He shouted. Thirty-four cam creamed, steely eyed marines turned to face him.

"Update from command! The Russkies have set up a fixed artillery battery in target's courtyard! Enemy ECM and Air defense means the arty and air support can't flatten it, so we've been tasked to take it out the hard way! Questions?"

There were none. Everyone knew what they had to do, this is what they trained for. The overhead intercom suddenly crack in with the voice of the boat commander.

"30 Seconds. Standby to beach."

"You heard him, lads! Stand too!"

The commandos rose to their feet and spread out as best they could, holding on to the hand holds to keep their footing. This was what they did best. The Royal Marines had long since proven their mastery of the art of amphibious assault, anytime, anywhere from the American coast to eastern sands, by sword, by gun, or by bare hand.

"Really missing the kid and his swords about now!" One of the marines said, shouting to be heard over the noise of the landing craft's engine as well as both the incoming and outgoing fire.

"Not a kid anymore!" Another marine shouted back, interrupted by the bark of the craft's own GPMGs opening fire on the shore.

"I saw him tonguing some fit ginger bird on the QE2! Our Boy's become a man!"

A heckling cheer and din filled the troop bay as the marines cheered and drummed their rifles against the deck in approval. Griffin couldn't help but smile. He was proud of his former apprentice. Young had done well for himself, both in military terms and, from the sound of it anyway, in his private life too…

The landing craft suddenly jerked to a halt and the laughed died. This was it.

For a heartbeat, nothing happened. Then the ramped drop and it was on.

"GO!"

The Marines stampeded out of the landing craft, stomping through the surf and rushing up the beach and away from the landing craft, spreading out as they did. Griffin was surrounded by the noise of war; the sharp snap, crack and pop of incoming and returning rifle and machine gun fire, the deafening buzz of helicopters passing low overhead, even a tooth rattling Boom! as a Challenger II rolled ashore and fired on an enemy machine gun position, demolishing an entire floor of the target seaside office block.

Just as Griffin reached the relative safety of the sea wall, a slightly familiar voice came over his earpiece. "Charlie-Four-Two-Zero, this is Ajax-one. Ajax's one and two are ashore and at your disposal. Over."

"Copy Ajax-one!" Griffin replied, happy to have close a hundred and forty tonnes of tanks attached to them. "Move up clear us a way off this beech!"

"Roger, out!"

The Pan-Asian Naval Alliance's ground forces had clearly prepared the beach against an infantry and light vehicle assault, having covered the beach with machine guns and barricaded the vehicle exits with abandoned cars and lorries, but he somehow doubted they'd been ready for main battle tanks roaring ashore.

Griffin watched as the two Challengers roared up the beach, each kicking up a trail of sand towards a ramp in the sea wall; the only place they could get vehicles off the beach, which was barricaded by wrecked vans and cars; probably booby trapped too. To his surprise (and horror of the defenders) rather than stop and attach heavy chains to drag them aside as was procedure, the tanks fired into the cars, blowing them aside with a single, well placed high explosive round before pushing up the ramp, shoving aside the burning vehicle remnants with their dozer blades.

"Let's Move!" Griffin shouted, leading his company up the ramp and following the tanks forward into one of the streets leading into town and towards their objective.

"One platoon, Left Side! Two platoon, Right! Three Platoon cover the rear! Command section on me!"

Under the guidance of their platoon Sergeants and officers, the marines quickly moved to their sides of the road, using the buildings as cover and protecting the tanks from any would be ambushers lurking in the buildings.

As the tanks pushed into town, Lieutenant Roberts popped his hatch and took control of his pintle mounted GPMG, racking the slide with a satisfying clack. He panned the weapon left to right, covering the marine's and tank's flanks as they passed streets and alleyways.

"Stay alert," he told his crew as well as the crew of Hellfire following behind over the platoon channel. "I want remote weapons covering high. Cover ground level windows and doors with the coax. Watch those thermals, I'll keep an eye on the streets."

Most of these buildings had been abandoned. It was unsurprising that they had been; very very few cities had been reoccupied in their full, most were divided into walled districts within the pre-fall settlement's who's names they carried. Most of the small houses and commercial buildings had been looted, some had even collapsed from years of abandonment. The crack of rifle fire rang out constantly from the middle distance, occasionally interrupted by a clatter of machine gun fire, the whine of a mortar shell, grump of a grenade, or the whoosh of a rocket launcher.

As Rosehip rounded the final corner to take them to their objective, Roberts' jaw dropped. Up ahead in the road, local forces had erected a barricade, with roughly a platoon of infantry waiting in cover… supported by a Type 90 main battle tank.

Roberts didn't even have time to finish screaming "CONTACT FRONT!" and duck into the turret before the Type 90's gun flashed. The sabot round ricocheted off Rosehip's turret, tearing away the remote weapons station leaving just a sparking torn base, and a large dent where the round had glanced off the turret armor. Rosehip shook from the impact, the sound of shearing metal and pops as small arms fire ricochet off her hull. Robert's dropped into the turret.

"DAMAGE REPORT!"

"Remote weapon station's gone!" Will shouted back. "But otherwise we're ok!"

"Casualties?"

"No, we're good!"

"Right! Fire! Sabot! Fire! Ice the fucker!" Robert's ordered as he stood back up in his cupola, grabbing his gimpy and opening fire as Rosehip jumped, her main gun kicking up a small dust storm as the HE round they'd had loaded left the barrel.

It slammed into Type 90, exploding on the Japanese tank beneath its gun barrel. It might have stunned, maybe wounded the crew, but the tank was still operational. No sooner had the spent shell casing clattered to the Challenger's floor, Mike hurled a Sabot round into the breech. And as soon as he was clear; Meg fired again.

Unlike High Explosive Anti-Tank rounds, or HEAT rounds, which used a jet of molten copper to melt through armor, Fin Stabilized Discarding Sabot rounds, FSDS or simply Sabot, fired a hypersonic tungsten dart that punched through tank armor with sheer kinetic energy. And while the Type 90 was a tough tank, it couldn't take a Sabot round at point blank range. The round punched through it's weakened, charred armor and gutted the interior; ripping through armor plate, hydraulics, ammunition, bulkheads and the crew, like a hot knife through butter. The tank's engine exploded and died as molten shrapnel cascaded through it, signaling the death of the tank.

With the death of their armor support, the enemy infantry's fire began to waiver. Seizing the chance, the Marine's rushed forward and started laying into the outnumbered defenders while the tanks kept their heads down with their coax machine guns. Keen to keep the attack moving, Griffin moved to the front.

"2 platoon, suppressing fire! 1 platoon, advance!"

Under the cover of two platoon and the tanks, 1 platoon leapfrogged forwards, each section taking turns laying down fire as their colleagues advanced. They got to within 20 meters of the barricade before Griffin shouted his next order.

"Fix bayonets!"

To some critics, the idea of a bayonet charge was archaic, barbaric, and downright uncivilized. They were right, but it was also damn effective. There are few things as terrifying as having thirty angry royal marines charging your position, screaming their heads off with the intent to bury a six-inch serrated steel blade into your guts. As the covering fire lulled to allow the marines to advance, some of the defenders poked their heads above their hastily erected barricade. They were horrified to be greeted with the sight of charging marines who either fired on them as they popped their heads up, or vaulted the barricade and ran them through with their bayonets, leaving no survivors.

"Position clear! Move up!"

Requiring no further invitation, Roberts ordered Rosehip forward. Dumping the forward mounted dozer blade, the close to seventy-tonne tanks pushed aside the barricade with as much effort as one might draw back a curtain. Even the Type 90, now immobile and dead, was pushed aside with little fuss; it's deceased crew and wrecked transmission offering no resistance to the Challenger's shoves.

With the obstacles clear, they pushed onto their final objective; the Army National Guard base.

What had previously been just a small training outpost, was now the lynchpin in the local defense. With the destruction of the enemy's pre-prepared artillery and HQ positions by infiltrating special forces teams, as well as artillery and air strikes; this small camp and the surviving wheeled artillery pieces that they had were the only serious military hardware the Naval Alliance had left.

The tanks pushed over the high wire fence surrounding the base and spread out with the marines flooding in; now free of the restricting confines of the city streets. However, it seemed that the defenders weren't willing to give up their last HQ without a fight.

Flashes of machine gun fire erupted from the windows of the buildings, peppering the tanks and cutting down some marines before they could take cover; what little there was to be had in the open training field they'd emerged into.

Griffin threw himself onto his belly as rounds cracked by where he had been a moment ago. As he propped himself up on his elbows and pulled his rifle into his shoulder, a deep dull thump, accompanied by the sound of snapping metal and metallic clamping drew his attention. One of the tanks, Hellfire shuddered to a halt some distance away, it's left track snapped and dangling off its front guide wheel, the crew spilling out of rapidly opening hatches.

"All tanks halt! All tanks halt!" Griffin shouted into his radio. "Enemy AT mines in play! Hold position and lay down covering fire until we can clear them."

As response, Rosehip's gun flared and reduced a barracks building to exploding rubble before panning around with its machine guns blazing into the other buildings. The volume of incoming fire seemed to lessen and Griffin seized the initiative while he could.

He sighted down his rifle's ELCAN sight and waited for a target to appear. Two hostile infantry appeared, carrying the long tube on an anti-tank weapon between them: intent on finishing the disabled Hellfire. Griffin snapped his sight to the soldier's chest and fired twice, hitting him twice before giving his partner the same treatment, dropping both of them. Springing to his feet, Griffin waived his marines' forward, leg's pumping hard to propel his armored form forward at a sprint into the cover of a nearby building, a section of marine's falling in behind him.

Glancing around the corner, Griffin sighted their objective. Dug into rapidly prepared positions were a trio of FH70 field guns, 155mm towed howitzers that were used by various countries globally and, while old, could still hurl a 43-kilogram high explosive shell up to 30 miles.

In front of the guns, however, were a series of sandbag gun positions manned with Type 62 machine guns. They would need to go before they could take the guns.

Formulating a plan, Griffin gave a quick brief to his troops:

"UGLs and LSWs up front, lay down a volley on those MG nests till they're gone. Once they're gone from a fire support section and watch out flanks. Everyone else with me, fire and maneuver through the enemy positions and into the gun battery. Just watch your fire, we don't need to be detonating any HE shells prematurely. Happy?"

The marines nodded, satisfied at the plan. One of them pulled a smoke grenade from his pouch and handed it to Griffin, who took it and pulled the pin, keeping the bumped depressed.

"Right, let's do it!" He said before throwing the black cylinder around the corner. The L83A2 smoke grenade spun in the air as its fuse ran out before landing in the grass, spraying a cloud of concealing white phosphorus between the machine gun positions and the Brits.

A sporadic reactionary burst of MG fire passed through the thickening smoke, before four marines sprinted forwards, two taking a knee, popping off 40mm grenades HE from their L85's under barrel grenade launchers while their other colleagues started firing suppressing bursts from their L86 Light Support Weapons, a longer barrelled light machine gun variants of the standard L85. When the 40mm grenades detonated and the machine gun's paused, Griffin shot to his feet.

"Let's go!" Griffin shouted as he shot around the corner, accelerating to a full sprint through the smoke screen, catching a lung full of white phosphorous as he did which caused him to cough, but kept going, pausing at the edge of the smoke cloud and dropping to a knee to fire short, full auto bursts at anything that moved before springing forwards again. He reached the MG position after a few sprinting strides. The gun nest was a fucking mess; the remains of the operator had caked the interior of the sandbags blood red with bits of sinew and bone pasted around the position, the poor boy's severed head shoulders lying among the gore. The smell and sight nearly made Griffin wretch. Poor bastard must have had one of the UGLs land right on top of them; a quick, if nasty way to go.

Around him, the firefight started to taper off, the artillery crews and remaining defenders had lost their stomach for a fight after the marines overran their final defense perimeter. Marines herded the surrendering soldiers together under the watchful eyes of the sergeants, searching them for any weapons or Intel at gunpoint.

As Griffin looked down at the machine gun nest; Lieutenant Roberts and Sergeant Roderick came up to him.

"Position secured sir," Roderick informed him. "The lads took the CP intact and we're sweeping out the last of the barracks buildings now."

"Good work Staff," Griffin said absently as he tore his gaze away from the gun nest. "What are our losses?"

"Three of yours dead, another four wounded," Roberts said, hands on his hips. "Another one of mine on top, Hellfire's driver lost his foot when ithit that mine."

"Have the medics set up a first aid post and evac the wounded," Griffin ordered. "Get everyone else not on the prisoners into defensive positions. I'll get on the horn to command to send up some reinforcements."

Roberts and Roderick nodded before heading off to their tasks, while Griffin took one last look at the head of the MG operator, before he went off in search of his command section's radio operator.

People die in war. It was an unfortunate side effect. But maybe by their actions and losses, others may their lives in peace.

So yeah, the last full chapter of Archangel. Standby for Epilogue...

Please Review/ favourite/ follow... well not much point following considering this is the last chapter, but hey, if you want...

Jango