Vortex

Von Brandis scrambled down the embankment to the waiting Ratel. Its turret was now firing, and he instinctively sheltered under its sides as another MiG screamed over.

He grabbed the dangling radio headset and put it on. Turning the earphone volume to maximum, he shouted, “Foxtrot Delta One, redeploy to the south!

You need to get flank shots on the tanks! Over!”

The reply was barely audible, but D Squadron’s commander spoke slowly.

“Cannot move. Not enough fuel. Two vehicles empty, laying turret manually. Aiming at tank tracks, will immobilize.” The bang-clank of a cannon’s firing punctuated his words.

More MiGs raced down the length of his line, strafing everything in their path. Each pass left more of his vehicles burning or abandoned.

Crack! Crack! Crack! The Cuban T-62s were now in range. Even though they had larger guns, it was hard to hit a small, dug-in target from a moving tank, so they’d held their fire until now. The crash of big armor-piercing shells filled the air.

HEADQUARTERS, CUBAN EXPEDITIONARY FORCE

The young staff officer’s high-pitched voice revealed his excitement.

“Comrade General! Colonel Pellervo reports that his tanks are just five hundred meters from the enemy!”

Vega nodded gravely. Now for the kill.

“All right, order our aircraft home, then shift the artillery fire as planned. Adjust, then pour a full rate of fire onto the enemy for three minutes. “

He allowed himself the faintest flicker of a smile as his orders were repeated over the radio. He’d spent years imagining the best way to crush a South African battalion in combat, drawing up and rejecting plan after plan-each aimed at matching his army’s strengths against the enemy’s weaknesses. Now it was working. The South Africans caught behind the railroad embankment simply couldn’t match his air power or artillery superiority.

5TH MECHANIZED INFANTRY

When von Brandis saw the aircraft leave, it was the first ray of hope in what had become an increasingly bleak situation. The MiGs must finally have run low on fuel or ammunition. Then he started wondering if he could get his remaining antiaircraft guns up to the embankment and redeployed before the Cuban infantry reached it. Those 20mm cannon would work well against personnel.

“It was getting hard to see. Each explosion kicked up sand and dust, and the smoke of the burning vehicles only added to the murk. It clung to his skin and filled his lungs. The enemy troops were visible only as dim, moving shapes though luckily still clear enough to aim at.

The Cuban foot soldiers were still advancing, coming on at an energy-conserving walk while their tanks had stopped and were firing their cannons and machine guns over their heads. Von Brandis could only see three T-62s on fire. Two or three more had been stopped by track hits, but that didn’t keep them from shooting.

He lowered his binoculars, considering his next move. He and his men weren’t out of trouble yet, but concentrated small-arms fire should be enough to stop this damned infantry attack. He didn’t have to expose his surviving armored cars and APCs to the T-62s.

Von Brandis started to grin. The Cuban commander had made his first serious mistake. The man should have kept his tanks together with the infantry.

In the roar of battle around him, he didn’t even hear the first few artillery shells whirring in from high overhead.

21 ST MOTOR RIFLE BATTALION, CUBAN

EXPEDITIONARY FORCE

The battery of towed 122mm howitzers attached to Colonel Pellervo’s battalion was eight kilometers back, deployed out of sight amid a sea of sand dunes fronting the Atlantic. But the artillery observer who controlled their fire occupied the tank next to Pellervo’s.

He was good and needed just four sighting rounds to get the battery on target. The first two were long, the third a little short, but the fourth landed squarely on the railroad tracks.

“Fire for effect!”

Each D-30 122mm gun could fire four shells a minute, for a short period of time. There were six howitzers in the battery, so twenty-four shells a minute rained onto the exposed South African battalion-shattering infantrymen caught out in the open, spraying fragments through open vehicle hatches, and fire balling armored cars with direct hits.

The Cuban gunners kept firing for three long, murderous minutes.

5TH MECHANIZED INFANTRY

Whammm! Whammm! Whammm!

Von Brandis felt as if he’d been kicked in the stomach by a mule as the first full Cuban salvo landed—each impact jarring and rattling the ground. He flattened, face pressed down into the heaving earth, deafened by the noise.

Each explosion threw a geyser of dirt into the air, sometimes mixed with fragments of men or equipment. Vehicles were torn open or simply blown to pieces. Fragments whizzing out more than twenty meters from the point of each explosion cut down anyone not totally prone-making it impossible for his men to keep firing and stay alive.