Colonel Sasha Timateovich Andreyev let his face wash in the small portable air fan he kept with him. This country was so disagreeably hot, even in the cooled air conditioned climate of the King Spider command vehicle. Andreyev had grown up on a farm in the harsh Siberian wastes. His life had been nothing but struggle, if it wasn't the cold that was trying to kill you, it was the wolves. And the silly earth conservation groups wanted to save these things? In America there weren't any true confirmed wolf killings but out in Siberia oh the wolves had been known (and taped, which was something those conservation groups quietly brushed under the table) to drag farmers out of their homes and tear them apart.
It wasn't merely survival of the fittest out there, it was a war as fierce as the one he was about to fight. He'd learned to fight that one well, he gave his enemy no quarter because surely they would give none to him. His great grandfather had been a sniper in the Great Patriotic War and the Mosin Nagat sniper rifle had been a family heirloom and tool used for wolf hunting.
Andreyev had learned that trade well, using poison, scent lures, the rifle. He'd been hunting wolves since he was eight, barely old enough to lift the gun. At age thirteen on market day where he sold wolf pelts for profit, a recruiter noticed his skill and sponsored him to join the Moscow Military Academy and he'd been a soldier since. He rose quickly amongst the ranks and even caught the notice of the state run SVR intelligence network where they recruited him again to join the special forces. By the time the war kicked off, Andreyev was a Lt. colonel of the 17th Spetsnaz Guard Brigade with a thousand fighting men and women under his command.
The Spetsnaz had grown into something…fiercer in the past twenty years, just as Andreyev was growing up as a matter of fact. For one thing, he not only commanded commando units, he had tanks and helicopters and artillery to direct which were far different from directing merely infantry.
Tanks were the doctrine of all Russian styles of warfare ever since the Great Patriotic War and Andreyev could see the value in grand armored charges supported by swarms of aircraft and curtains of artillery fire. Here at Warsaw, there would be little difference.
The terrain was flat and from what his forward recon elements could see, the enemy had trenches and camouflaged heavy guns. He'd have to use his artillery to cover his tank advance which in turn would cover his infantry and the GRU regulars that would be intermingled in his force (the GRU commander had respectfully submitted to Andreyev's tactical command) would help shield his own Spetsnaz troops.
Like most Spetsnaz group commanders, Andreyev held disdain for the efficiency of the regular GRU, even if they were class A and therefore the top of the line. Their technology lagged at least a decades behind the Spetsnaz although there was an agreeable amount of T-100s and KA-65s in the helicopter and armored regiments which were usually made up of just T-95s and Mi-28s.
What all of these units, old, new, infantry and armor had in common was that they all had an IFF tag which was copied from the American Blue Force Tracker. This was linked up to the flat tactical display that lay in front of Andreyev like a chess board.
Andreyev closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
"Enemy air activity is fierce sir." The tactical air officer reported. "Our fighters are having many problems reaching the front, air support will be limited."
"route enemy air positions here Comrade Lieutenant." Andreyev said and flipped the display to show the tactical air view. From the gridded cross sections. Andreyev could see that his support groups were being engaged twenty miles behind the front, too far away for them to actually help him. The enemy aircraft would be in range of his AA soon.
"Keep your SAM's offline until I give the word." Andreyev ordered the captain in charge of air defense as he switched back to the ground view. The battlefield beckoned him and the enemy invitingly lay in trenches, a stationary position that was primitive and horribly out of date to hold against a massive wave assault like this. "What's the wind speed and direction?"
"Wind's blowing east at low speed sir."
The wind was at his back, and the sails of his army would billow in them. He made his opening decision and opened a channel to his Zhukov self propelled howitzers.
"Fire coordinates map grid five seven seven five to five seven nine six. Fire package blue."
There was a distinctive sound in the air now, like an amplified tearing of fabric only the fabric was the air and the thing tearing it was-
The first shell burst a hundred meters away, kicking up dirt and raising a very distinctive orange cloud-
"Chemical shelling!" Captain Sopot shouted and immediately clipped the breathing mask and goggles on. the first shell had been a gimmick Sopot realized soon after, as that one had hit the ground. The majority of the others burst into the air the better to disperse their gas amongst the troops. The Russians would use such horrible weapons against them! They would pay, Sopot promised, his veteran commandos had their gas masks already in place but a few of the reservists were much slower off the mark, fumbling in barely rehearsed rote as the black masks were slipped on. they hampered breathing and vision drastically, his only comfort was that the Russians would be the ones on the short end of this stick, death would be coming from all around them where as Sopot only had to direct his fire in one direction. Such was the poor tactics of the Russians.
The trees parted then gave way to a short line of T-100 ogres, heavy tanks with special blades attatched on the front hull so they could rip trees from their roots and charge forward with as little effort as driving over an anthill.
The orange gas descended amongst the trenches, obscuring Sopot's first view of the enemy slightly before the advanced visor kicked in and outlined the enemy for him. There weren't that many attacking his line, only four Ogres? Did they really think them that weak? Well his missile launchers would make them deeply regret that mistake…
Andreyev watched his forward tanks reach firing range, he paid particular attention to the Major in charge of Mastadon squadron who would be the first person to ever implement this sort of tactic. He had thirty tanks attacking a six mile wide line that had already been prepared by his chemical shelling. If the Europeans realized how much danger they were actually in they weren't reacting which meant they really didn't understand.
"Signal weapons hot to all units." He ordered.
Sopot ducked down below the trenches and into the "rabbit hole" dugout that was serving as a land line communications trench.
"That is not a chlorine or mustard gas." Sopot's colonel noted with quite some alarm in his voice, "we are not yet sure of the make up of it but we can confirm it is not a standard chemical agent."
"Could it be a bioweapon?" Sopot asked with some nervousness, what were the Russians playing at?
"Unsure, it is possible-"
Sopot was engulfed in flame.
The hydrogen gas shelling wasn't a new technology in the Russian arsenal, in fact it had been theorized in the 1960s and was only recently introduced when a newer less reactive element had been mixed with the hydrogen so that it would only ignite when in direct contact with flame.
Andreyev's Zhukov artillery weapons had launched a two punch salvo of both ground and air dispersal shells, that had the desired effect of engulfing all three forward and rear infantry trenches and on Mastadon's command had fired their napalm "bumblebee" weapons in a short burst. The result was instantaneous.
A wildfire ripped through the trenches and what troops weren't immediately burned were found deprived of oxygen. The flames burned hottest and longest in the trenches, where the gas had been allowed to settle and where the majority of the European infantry were at. A few individual squads managed to climb out of the flames, these were usually the special warfare troops who were given more advanced armor although they were being roasted alive in them. The least amount of casualties would be located in the rear, while their front ranks would be absolutely annihilated. He ordered the rest of his armored groups forward in a reserved attack, while he waited for the European counter attack which he would be prepared for. Andreyev was the wolf here, and these Europeans were not experienced hunters as he was.
Sopot tried to block out the screams of men and women being cooked alive. He'd never heard such a horrible sound, wailing and screaming mixed with the roar of a fire that had found roosts on the skins of his fine troops or even the very ground on which he walked. He climbed out of the trench as did some of the smarter ones. God even the air was on fire, everything was a roaring sheet of flame, left right up down forward backward he was trapped in a dome of fire. He saw a couple of his men get up and run to where the second line of trenches were and therefore the rear but suddenly they stumbled and fell twitching on the ground. He turned and saw the hulking form of a T-95 tank, its hull smoking and its 7.62mm machine gun flashing as it turned on more of his troops who had managed to survive the first wave of the attack.
The first wave? It hadn't even finished and with that horrifying thought Sopot sprinted all the way back to his trenches trying and failing to not stare at the ground and at all the men and women who had died to nature's most terrible element.
The colonel of the 107th immediately saw the danger and in a very alarmed voice (those were his men being massacred out there!) ordered a blanket artillery fire on that position and immediate close air support on the enemy artillery.
European air command responded quickly and efficiently, the Hailstorms had already been stacked up and on call, with the AWACS on station immediately tagging the enemy artillery which would be hit with cluster bombs and at very high speed. The fire controller on board sent the hailstorms in from the north, where they would deal the most damage in a single pass. Cheetah's and Gazelle gunships raced forward to cover the infantry retreat as Enforcer tanks began to engage at maximum range against the juggernaut T-100s and T-95s.
Enforcer Marksman self propelled guns raised their heavy cannon to the fire mission azimuths locked their rods into the ground to brace them for the fire and unleashed their payloads, heavy rounds and air burst rounds that would shower on the armored charge and hopefully stop it in its tracks…
The Russians had a mobile fire finder radar on one of the heavy tracks and immediately noted the position of the enemy artillery which was located in the suburb section of Warsaw. The Russian fire finder was powerful, and able to track each individual shell's trajectory back to its source. The mobile air radar also detected close air support in the form of fighter bombers and gunships that would come in from the north and the west respectively.
Andreyev ordered his SAM's to illuminate now while he brought his anti air flak weapons forward to engage the helicopters. To his reserve artillery groups (because he hadn't used all of them in the initial volley, he designated the enemy artillery coordinates and simply ordered his own long guns to "flatten them".
The casualty reports began streaming in.
The roar of heavy artillery raining down not three hundred meters from Sopot's position was enough to make him almost collapse and weep. He and most of his Kommandos had barely made it out alive, the environmental conditioning equipment his troops wore turned out to be lifesaving in a wildfire and their relief was evident even though they were still in the fight. Some of his men he'd found out had died because the heat was so much they cooked off their grenades and ammunition. When Sopot looked down, he noticed a few of his own bandoliers had ruptured and had only been stopped by the protection plates that covered all of his vital points.
It was as eye opening as the wall of flame that licked and flickered before him. He could see the Enforcer Panther tank fire another shot and wondered how in the world could they target anything with death staring right at them in the face and consuming so many of their comrades.
"Can we not do anything?" an Italian lieutenant asked. "Anything at all to help our brothers?" his voice cracked, he was so young.
"Against tanks and artillery, we have nothing." Sopot managed to find his voice though each one was stuck against his throat. Out of his hundred, most had survived but there were sixteen who had not and those losses were light in comparison to the Reservists. "our missiles would be cooked in such a heat and explode before they reached the target." Before Sopot could say anything more the emergency command override cut into his channel.
"Guardian Guardian Guardian" the code phrase made Sopot want to weep with shame and relief at the same time.
It was the order for full retreat, Sopot lifted his rifle and leaped onto the hull of a rapidly backtracking Panther, its main gun blazed one last time before taking cover behind the corner of a building. A battle had been fought today, and everyone knew who the winners and losers were.
The contact was made via email, a dead drop one off of Yahoo! And a meeting was arranged here in Tel Aviv. The contact had responded quickly, and here she was, only a day after making that contact (Dolan had sent the email before she had even gotten permission to form the team) he was here. Or at least he was supposed to be.
Dolan sat in her favorite little café, where usually the coffee was good, the service was nice and the atmosphere friendlier than back in the states. Now, there were so few of the young people that helped make this atmosphere cheery that it seemed almost abandoned. The only ones around were still in secondary school and weren't usually allowed off campus for lunch breaks. Dolan sipped her ice coffee and waited, she faced the doorway while she read the daily newspaper. There was a little pinhole that she could peer through from time to time so that she could see who entered the door, it was an old spy trick.
The pinhole was blotted out and she heard the scuff of a chair on tile.
"Patricia?" the sixty-ish and oddly fit man asked, he had grey hair that was cut short like American lawns and the aviator glasses hid the eyes that she suspected were blue.
"Yes?" she said as she peered around the newspaper and accepted the stretched hand.
"John Clark. Good to meet you." The man shook her hand, it was very strong and rugged, hands that had obviously been places and performed work. Clark, that was a familiar name to Dolan, this was her contact but for security reasons they had not disclosed each others names. The fact that he had managed to deduce her first name showed the skill of this operator.
"Clark? Where have I heard that name before?"
"I used to be Agency, and did very hush hush jobs." Clark said and peered over his glasses. So he still was Agency and still doing black operations. "Your contacts must be very good to have me dragged all the way here."
"Gus Werner pointed you out." Dolan was on very good terms with the Director of Intelligence (Operations) in the CIA.
"Good man, young but smart head on his shoulders." Clark nodded. "But anyway your message intrigued me, what can you do me for?"
"You understand that everything I disclose here is confidential?" Dolan asked in a low voice. Clark sniffed as if slightly insulted.
"Of course."
"I need to assemble a special operations team that can infiltrate Turkey, I need three men who know the area and people, access to safehouses, equipment, weapons, the lot."
"I know the area, safe houses not so much but let me make a couple calls and see who I can fetch." Clark nodded. "Have you thought out the logistics of the operations though?"
"How do you mean?"
"It takes more than just good observation to work up international intel." Clark said and shook his head. "You used to be an HRT analyst right? That's counterterrorism, great field to work in, a lot less complicated than real intelligence work. But anyway what I understand, from what you haven't told me but a couple of my sources have is that your planning an operation that could possibly lead to the assassination of one or more higher echelon people in Turkey and all these hostile countries. That's really dirty stuff, and the type of surveillance you need to plan that sort of operation is really tech heavy, stuff you're probably not familiar with. That means hard and softwiring equipment, bead radios, low band encryptions, pincameras, bugging equipment, recon drones, and of course the stuff that goes boom if you need it." Clark finished quietely. Dolan was very impressed, now this was a pro.
"yeah I'm new." Dolan shook her head and allowed herself to spill that one for Clark. "But its what needs to be done, and you're here to advise me right? You want in too?"
"Why else would I be here?" Clark nodded matter of factly. "I've got a lot more field experience than most of the officers at agency have combined. And trust me, as good as your Israeli guys are, they're going to be lost in Turkey and such a small team probably doesn't have the range of abilities and equipment needed to perform a deep strike operation as quickly and effectively as you think. I can get you the equipment, latest from the agency in fact and I can ring up a couple of my buddies and see what we can do from there."
"Alright." Dolan nodded. "You seem to know a lot about the job."
"I have a lot of years under my belt." Clark said and sipped his iced coffee as it arrived. "And don't worry, I know where you stand, I used to head a counterterror team back in the day before I retired from that."
"Which one?" Dolan cocked her head.
"Rainbow." Clark sipped his drink nonchalantly. "I was Rainbow Six."