War with Russia

Krauja pushed forward, ripped open her first field dressing and wrapped it around the remains of his arm. A second dressing was strapped around his shoulder. The others passed forward more dressings and while Krauja put on all the pressure she could, Morland pulled his field tourniquet from his webbing, wrapped it around Lukša’s upper arm and tightened it. Slowly the blood flow eased. He reached back into his webbing and grabbed a morphine syrette.

“Hold tight, Arvydas. I’ll just give you a shot of morphine to ease the pain.”

Lukša looked at him with gritted teeth. “We Lithuanians don’t feel pain. Just stop the blood and I’ll be fine. I want to keep my head clear for killing fucking Russians.”

Morland looked at him in stunned admiration and, in that moment, knew that with soldiers like Lukša, they’d get out of this somehow. He felt a surge of adrenalin kick in. And anger. Unaccountably the fear had gone. He looked at Bradley, SA80 again on automatic, continuing to fire above the barley.

“Boss!” Bradley shouted. “The gun group are in action. The fire is easing off.”

Morland risked another look above the corn. From the corner of the forest behind them was the unmistakable and pleasingly familiar noise of burst after burst of GPMG. Cleverly sited in defilade, it was out of sight of the Russians manning what had to be a 12.7 millimeter heavy machine gun. Had the Russians been able to see them, it would have been no contest: Archer and Watson would soon be dead meat. Instead, they were doing good work and he could see their tracer landing all around the machine gun position to their left. Then the fire coming from that direction stopped. And that gave them the briefest of respites as the Russians turned all their fury on the GPMG.

Bradley grabbed Lukša and, helped by Krauja, dragged him on his back through the corn like a life-saver pulling a drowning man to shore, while Morland and Webb continued to engage the enemy.

Inch by inch, foot by foot, they fought their way forward through the corn. Never had fifty meters taken so long but eventually, sweat streaming down their faces, they reached the edge of the sunken lane, slid under the hedge and into the bottom. How they had not all been killed was still a complete puzzle to Morland; they had been little more than stationary targets out there in the corn. Moreover, the compound guards were bound to have sophisticated night sights in those watchtowers—which was probably why the lights had been switched off—and that Korda could have hosed them down in seconds. The more he thought about what had just happened, the less sense it made.

Morland took a quick pull on his water bottle. His throat was raw with all the shouting and he needed all the energy he could muster. Leaving Krauja to continue to administer first aid to Lukša, Morland and Webb crawled up the other side. The heavy machine gun from the watchtower had given up trying to hit the GPMG team and now switched back to them. Tracer was smacking into the barley fire fifty yards behind them, where they’d originally been contacted. However, the rounds coming from their rear left had suddenly stopped; Archer and Watson must have knocked out that light machine gun, although fire was still coming from the machine gun to their right. They might be safe for the moment, but they were not going anywhere. They were trapped.

“I’ve given the reserve group the grid of the enemy gun group on the edge of the forest line to our rear right!” yelled Webb in Morland’s ear. “They’ve got plenty of fire power so they should be able to suppress them.”

“What about air?” asked Morland, marveling at how laid-back he was now feeling after the initial terror of the ambush. “There’s no way we’re going anywhere until that heavy machine gun is knocked out. And the air assault is due in any minute.” The luminous dials on his army issue G1098 watch told him it was 0315.

“Don’t worry about that. My guys at the LZ can guide them forward. And I don’t think the air assault will need much guiding in. They’re getting the full light show after all…” Webb gave him a grin. “We’ll stay put and help look after you guys. Anyway, I’ve got to guide the air onto the compound, and for that I need eyes on.”

Webb stopped and listened to his earpiece. He then turned back to Morland. “F-16 with Maverick inbound. Time on target, five minutes. Time to paint the target.”

With that he reached into his daysack and pulled out his An/PEQ-1 SOF Laser Marker, a hand-held, laser target-designator, the size of a small video camera. He switched it on and pointed it at the watchtower where their tormentor was located, looking through the optical sight as he did so. As he held it steady on the ground, an intensely focused laser beam—invisible to the men in the tower—shone at the target. It would be picked up by the sensor on the incoming aircraft; the muzzle flash of the Korda being Webb’s aiming point.