"Diamond City Security has enough food and water for the populace for about a week, from us.", the General announced. "Given a total collapse of their own farms and 'lake'. I don't think we'll actually be looking at a starvation problem before we break the siege.
"What I'm worried about is the damage to the economy. Not only is Diamond City the biggest trading partner with...well, everyone in the Commonwealth. I don't know that the culture of the community will allow a recovery if the flow of caps stalls for too long."
Geneva nodded. "Even if it came to emergency rationing, I just know that upper stands residents would demand a somehow 'better' or 'more' that will build resentment. Maybe to the point of riots. Or if we're really unlucky, the belief that there could be a reasonable surrender to the super mutants."
"Yeah, I can just see that.", Colonel Brandis declared. "First term of surrender: open the gate. Second term of surrender: get ate."
The three leaned back from the conference table in the General's office. A tourists map that was way too old and way to dirty of the Boston area, meant to be thrown away after a day of site seeing but now surprisingly useful like the rest of the 'junk' of the Wasteland, lay unfolded on the table before them. It had been marked and re-marked with sightings and reports of the super mutant siege of what was labeled as Fenway Park.
"Who do you even have down there?", Brandis continued. "They've got to be either one tough sumbitch or the craziest man you've got to poke their noses into that mess."
"I'd rather not say.", the General answered. "I mean, you can figure it out easily enough. But if no one bothers to, I'm not going to give it away."
"Yes, General.", he obliged.
"So how are you going to free the city?", Geneva asked.
"That's what we're trying to decide.", the General snapped back. "We have to clear Diamond City. But we have to have enough of Diamond City Security alive afterward to reform the envelope that surrounded the stadium."
"And the Commonwealth falls if we were to just throw Minutemen at the situation.", Brandis added.
"We have to come about this smart.", the woman continued. "It's our primary advantage over the super mutants as far as I've seen."
"Look alive.", she said pointing at the map. "There's a few clever plays we can set up. Like the police station for Precinct 8. We can come through there and break any line that forms. But it might be better to send an APC from the north and the south and then again from another street over. That way, the enemy will be pressed, lose the street, duck through the police station themselves and be trapped that way."
"That's no good.", Brandis stated. "Consider your lines of sight. Any attempt to come at the eastern wall would be caught by the mutants camped out at the gate."
The General agreed. "Okay, you're right.
"What about breaking on the northeast corner, then? Because of the street leading away from the northern wall, we can turn the corner facing the middle of the northern wall and the northeast corner simultaneously. The patrol up and down the northern wall can get ambushed before the reinforcements in the buildings lining the streets can be mobilized."
"By about half a minute.", Brandis scoffed. "Even if we did mow down the ones on patrol, the others would stuff that street again in moments."
"Exactly.", the General pointed out. "The super mutants are betting that they're big and tough and numerous enough that Diamond City Security couldn't ever punch through the main gate. They're only keeping patrols to keep watch and make sure no one's slipping over the wall.
"What we don't know is how much they're expecting us, the Minutemen. They may be too stupid to anticipate another force. They might be too evil to think someone would come to help...but then again, I've seen them use hostages as bait before. On the other hand, the could be anticipating us. This works in either case.
"Once we take out that patrol, there's a whole in their line. Which means they can't resupply continuously. Also, if they are worried that someone could slip over the wall, any area we control along the wall allows that to happen. They're forced to retake the area."
Brandis nodded. "And they don't know how many or strong our forces would be. So they have to take men away from every other part of the line...including the main gate. Is that what you're going for?"
"Eventually.", the General answered. "We just need to draw them away into cross fires. The northeast looked the easiest because the lines of sight are blocked by buildings the longest. When they give chase, we can pincer them from the sides.
"We can do it again from the south. You see this street that goes from being one block south of the stadium on the east to meeting up with where the gate is on the west? As soon as we turn onto it, we're in the line of fire from the main group camping outside the gate. But if we come through the police station/"
"We antagonize the same hole on the northeast.", Brandis assessed. "This nearly screams two main force groups."
Geneva glanced back and forth between the two Minutemen commanders. "Two? You haven't said anything about the super mutants that are trapping people inside at the main gate."
Both the General and the Colonel stood and pointed over the map. "No, no...that's the second attack.", the General stated while pointing. "See, we'll come around this way from prepping first.", Brandis explained.
Geneva tried to follow their fast paced speech explaining the strategy. "So this harrass and draw? One group of Minutemen will poke at the super mutants until they chase you into pre-set traps. This will keep reducing super mutant numbers until the main gate isn't the hell zone described. A different group of crews, stationed at Hang Man's Alley, will then come south and then turn the corner east to approach from the west. This will turn the gate area into an 'anvil'. A large force of APCs will hold this intersection outside the main gate, and all the super mutants on the eastern wall won't have a way out on that street nor the ones on the southern wall. After the cross fires happen to the north and east, those Minutemen will become twin 'hammers': chasing the surviving super mutants back to the southwest where the 'anvil' will be once the lines thin."
"I think she's got it.", Brandis stated.
The General pursed her lips. "Let's get it done."
