Ghost Sniper

He eased himself around the side of the sand barrier until he could see the machine gun nest through the telescopic sight. The optics were quite powerful. The scope was at least a four power, making the Germans appear four times closer. While he had dimly been able to make out the German gunners before, they now seemed to be a few feet away. He could even see their faces, just visible above the rim of the concrete pillbox. He put the crosshairs over the helmet of the man behind the machine gun and fired. Through the scope, he saw sand kick up a few feet in front of the pillbox. The machine gunner never noticed Cole because his attention was on shooting anything that moved on the beach.

The rifle was sighted in for a closer range. All right, then. He took aim again, this time floating the crosshairs just above the helmet, and then squeezed the trigger.

Cole never really saw the bullet hit home. One moment the German was there, and the next he was gone.

Abruptly, the machine gun stopped firing. Another man moved to take the dead gunner’s place. Cole shot him as well. He worked the bolt action again, took aim, and shot the third man in the pillbox.

He started to hand the rifle back to the lieutenant, who shook his head. “You hang on to that, soldier. Where’s your unit?”

“Don’t know, sir. Mostly dead, I reckon.”

“You stick with me, then. We’re going to put that rifle to use.” The lieutenant shouted loud enough to be heard by the men taking cover nearby. “Listen up! We have to get the hell off this beach or we’re all going to get killed. Now let’s move out!”

The lieutenant jumped up and ran forward toward the next anti-tank barricade. Cole ran after him. Again, it wasn’t much shelter, but it was better than nothing. Other men surged forward all around them, finding what shelter they could, or simply throwing themselves flat against the sand after running ahead a few feet.

Up and down Omaha Beach, shells still burst overhead and machine gun fire kept up its deadly chatter. The sands were now a blood-soaked killing field. Cole had silenced the pillbox directly in front of them, so the men moved forward again, not even waiting for the lieutenant’s order. They ran farther and faster this time, even with their waterlogged boots and gear.

Cole expected every step to be his last. Crossing the open beach, he had never felt so naked and exposed. Though the machine gun was silent, they were starting to take rifle fire from the Germans in the sand dunes. Gratefully, he threw himself down on the sand beside the lieutenant.

Cole looked through the sight and saw that a German squad was moving back into the pillbox. If the machine gun was manned again, the American soldiers moving up the beach would be chewed to pieces.

He was breathing too hard to take good aim. He needed something to rest that rifle on. He looked ahead, but there was nothing between them and the bunkers but a final stretch of open sand and curls of barbed wire. Cole shifted around and put the rifle across the lieutenant’s pack.

“Hey!” The lieutenant started to get up, but Cole pushed him back down.

“Better hold still, sir, or we’re all going to wind up dead.”

The Germans did get off a burst from the machine gun, but Cole shot them in quick succession. Then he was up and running toward the dunes. He got as far as the barbed wire before throwing himself flat. The lieutenant had wire cutters, and he snipped a path through the wire. More men were moving up and doing the same.

The big guns up in the dune bunkers could not angle down far enough to fire at the Americans who had made it this close to the German positions, but they were taking plenty of fire from the troops in the bunkers, who were targeting Americans with their Mauser rifles and even submachine guns. One by one, Cole picked them off. He bought the lieutenant and the other men enough time to move through the field of barbed wire.

Then the lieutenant threw a grenade through the slit of a concrete bunker. There was a flash and bang of high explosive, and then the enemy guns fell silent. The tide of battle had suddenly changed on Omaha Beach.

CHAPTER 2

Supreme Allied Commander General Dwight D. Eisenhower lit another cigarette, sucked the smoke deep into his lungs, and studied the wall-size map in the operations center for what seemed like the millionth time.

The map portrayed the English Channel and the French coast at Normandy, with units and ships, even airplanes, indicated by cut-out shapes that were periodically moved about the map by smartly uniformed WACS. It might all have been mistaken for a classroom exercise if the mood in the room had not been so tense and somber.