Several of the men gasped at the numbers. “How could it be so high?” asked Kelso.
“I’ll show you,” said Hammond. He looked at the operator. “Take it to the front so they can see the drones.”
The image zoomed in further and the men could see the drone units going across the landscape. In several instances, troops in front of them simply fell over dead as they passed by. Allied assault troops followed the drones in and continued, unhindered, on their way. “Eyeball is linked to our Link 16 system and everyone on the ground can see where the bad guys are. We coordinate things all the way to the ground level. Of course, the troops and fliers have no idea where the Link is getting its information, but they know it is accurate,” said Hammond. With a motion, the operator moved the image back to a broader area.
“This is why I am asking that no one ever know about what you are seeing here. If it got out, our enemy might find a way to counter it or to down our satellites. It would mean our casualties might climb almost as high as the Russians’. I want to get our people home and safe. This is helping me do that,” Hammond said.
Hammond stopped talking and let the men see the marvel in front of them, then said, “Take it to Sevastopol.”
The image shifted to the city on the Black Sea. “This is what we are watching at present.”
The men saw an American battleship entering Sevastopol harbor with two more battleships patrolling offshore. “Who is that?” asked Freeman.
Hammond smiled. “That’s my old ship, USS Iowa. They are going in to see if the Russians will surrender the city.” He pointed to a large group to the east. “Those are the Americans and the Turks.” He pointed to the northwest. “Those are the Italians and Spanish. The city is surrounded and we are hoping we can all stop here,” Hammond said. “If they fire on her, all bets are off.”
The R-44 crew was freezing. With the electricity out throughout the country there was nothing to power the electric heaters on the ship. Men huddled around in heavy blankets and multiple layers of clothing. Very little maintenance was doing since there was no way to effectively work in the engine rooms or lower spaces. It was miserable. When the orders came to sortie against the American ship, the crew just looked up with cold, tired eyes. Even Captain Potemkin had given up trying to make sense of it. But he had a job to do, even if it meant killing his crew. Barking out orders, the crew finally went below to fire up the ship’s main engines.
Knowing there was only a few hundred gallons of fuel in the ship’s tanks, the crew climbed down into the ship’s engine rooms and stared at the huge diesel engines. A team went over to the diesel generator and with a few adjustments, it started and the lights came on throughout the ship. A few more switches and the ship’s heating systems came on. At least they would be warm when they met their deaths.
After priming the fuel and lubrication pumps, the engineering crew hit the starter on one of the main engines. Nothing happened. The engine turned over, but the cylinders did not fire. While several men began checking the engine over, the second engine was made ready. Once again, the engine would not start. Now men frantically began checking the fuel systems to make sure fuel was getting into the engine. The glow plugs were checked to see if they were working. Everything was looked into. After fifteen minutes the generator began spitting, lost revolutions and finally died. Once again, the lights went out throughout the ship. Working with flashlights, the men finally figured out what had happened. Water was in the fuel tanks. The last of the usable fuel had been used by the generator. Now there was no way to get underway. A tired, but happy crew settled back in their blankets. At least they knew they would remain alive.
Five trucks scurried through the streets of Sevastopol trying to get to the high ground above the harbor. There was already an old battery of guns there, but they hadn’t worked in ages. Instead, they were dragging Sprut anti-tank guns, a 4.9 inch weapon that had armor piercing rounds available. These were the last pieces of artillery the Army commander had. They had been salvaged from the battlefields several times and looked beat up, but they were available.
On the way up the hill, one of the drivers looked back to see smoke pouring from one of the wheels of his gun. He tried to slow to a stop, but as he applied the brakes, the wheel came off the gun, causing it to dig into the ground. This broke the pin on the tongue of the truck mounting and the gun flipped over the side of an embankment, striking a house and causing the wall to collapse on top of it.
Another driver was racing along a dirt road. The ruts and potholes had the entire gun carriage bouncing like a rubber ball. The pin holding the trailer to the truck was just a piece of steel the driver had salvaged when the original pin was lost. As the pounding intensified, it too snapped. The tongue of the gun carriage immediately dug into the ground. With the truck going nearly 50 miles per hour, it flipped the gun over landing with a bang on the gun itself. When the driver stopped to see what could be done, he found the gun and its mechanisms scattered across the road.
Three of the guns made it to the old gun emplacement. Men piled out of the trucks to plant the pads to stabilize the guns, then turned them toward the huge ship coming into the harbor. Ammunition was brought forward and they quickly found that one of the guns was a different variant from the others and used different ammunition. The other two were quickly loaded and on orders from the General in charge, prepared to fire on the ship.
The breeches were closed and the men stood back. The young officer in charge ordered the guns to fire. On the left gun, a sergeant pulled the lanyard only to see the firing mechanism spring off the gun and land on the ground. The securing mechanism had shattered. On the right gun the lanyard was pulled and nothing happened. It was reset and pulled again. Once again, nothing happened. Carefully, the breech was opened. There were no marks on the powder casing. Upon careful examination, the firing pin was bent and jammed in the breech.
The dejected gun crews could do little else than to watch as the ship came to a halt within range of their guns. There wasn’t another piece of artillery they could get. The tanks that had been assigned were still at the front.
At six different positions around the harbor, rocket launchers were aimed at the American battleship. In each case, the trigger was pulled and nothing happened. Two of the missiles were found to be duds. Another two missiles were later found to have broken leads to the firing squibs. One missile went off only after the operator had become disgusted that it seemingly didn’t work and had pointed it toward their own troops. It bounced off the road several times before striking a tree. The last missile caught fire in the tube. The operator threw it to the ground and watched it burn.
Inside the white fortress, one old piece of artillery remained usable. Ammunition had been found and the gun loaded. No one really wanted to be around the old piece when it went off, but one man finally volunteered to pull the lanyard. The old powder went off with a fizzle and they saw the projectile come out of the barrel and hit the ground thirty feet away. The officer in charge saw it was a hopeless effort. He ordered his men to put the ammunition away and watched as a small boat with a white flag left one of the piers and made its way toward the ship.