“Then get us the fuck around! Get off the road, damn it!”
The tank jerked again to the side and then rumbled forward, skirting the smoldering crater carved out of the tar road. Kulkarni got on the comms again: “all rhino elements: keep moving! Do not stop! I say again, do not stop or they will bracket us in their kill zones!”
He switched comms instantly: “steel-central, this is rhino-one! We are taking fire from enemy tube artillery two kilometers west of the breach point! We are maintaining advance! Over!”
“Any casualties?” Sudarshan asked.
“Negative, sir. But that won’t last. Somebody needs to go put those damn enemy guns out of commission!”
“Roger, Rhino-one. We are working on it! Ferrite-actual is moving into position. In the meantime, continue the advance to waypoint baker! Out.”
The tank shuddered again as another explosion ripped through the ground nearby. Kulkarni had to hold on to the turret frame to prevent himself from being smashed against the sides. Advancing through the incoming fire prevented the Pakistanis from bracketing Rhino force into a stationary kill zone. It reduced the artillery’s accuracy and chances of scoring a direct hit against the top turret armor. But how long would that luck hold out?
“Enemy positions!” The gunner shouted. “One kilometer northwest! They have optics on us!”
At least that explains the shifting artillery fire… Kulkarni thought as he peered through the sights. He saw optical reflections against the morning sunlight hitting the Pakistanis directly. That was helpful to the Indian forces, as expected. Kulkarni had every intention of grabbing that advantage.
“All rhino elements: enemy defensive lines nine-hundred meters west. Open fire! And do not stop! Fire on the move and roll over the enemy! Force their artillery to either fire on their own troops or to stop fire. Either way, we have nothing to lose! Execute!”
The sound of two-dozen high-explosive tank rounds leaving their barrels was loud enough to drown out the incoming artillery. First the line of Arjun tanks disappeared into a cloud of flame and smoke… and then the Pakistani lines. The high-explosive tank shells slammed into their positions. The smoke from the main guns washed over the ever advancing mass of Arjun tanks as they kept moving, firing tank rounds as fast as the loaders could ready them…
It was all about maintaining fire superiority. It didn’t matter if the tank rounds hit any specific target or not. If they did, that was wonderful. If not, they forced the enemy to keep their heads down and deal with the explosive concussions ripping through their bodies. The vibrations affected their aim and the thunderclaps forced them to lose focus and coherence. War is as much psychological as it is physical. Kulkarni understood that only too well.
Peering through his sights in thermal mode allowed him to see past the clouds of smoke, sand and dust that had enveloped the Pakistani positions. His other sights were already having difficulty from “brown-out”. They couldn’t see through all the particles flying all over the place and threatened to envelop their entire view. The enemy artillery fire slackened off as well.
“All rhino elements! Check fire! Halt! Halt! Halt!”
The tank shuddered to a halt and the guns stopped firing. Kulkarni continued to peer through his sights while his gunner waited for the view to clear. He depressed the button to flick the view from thermal to visual, changing the white-black monochrome view into shades of brown, green and blue of the sky above. For his purposes, however, the view was no better: they couldn’t see anything.
“Rhino-two, — three and — four. Do you have targets?”
“Negative.”
“No targets.”
“Uh… we are brown-out. Can’t distinguish anything!”
Kulkarni realized that they had driven up right in front of the Pakistani infantry lines. He must have been facing perhaps two companies of troops at best. The rest of that Pakistani battalion must be nearby somewhere…
“Rhino-four,” he said without peering away from his sights, “peel off here and flank southwest with your boys. I want to see how far south this enemy defensive line stretches. Rhino-three, do the same to the northwest. Rhino-two, you are with me. We are rolling over these bastards to our front. Rhino-three and — four, rendezvous with us down the road, two kilometers out. Don’t get bogged down. I want you guys scouting, not slugging it out. Understood?”
“Roger. Rhino-three copies all. Out.”
“Rhino-four at your service. Combat recon all the way.”
Kulkarni saw the twelve tanks of rhino-four to the south swiveling to the southwest and spewing smoke and sand as they began rolling in formation. He swiveled his sights to the north and saw another twelve tanks of rhino-three doing the same. That left the bulk of Rhino still staggered around him, and the dust cloud was settling.
He switched frequencies: “all elements, rhino-one and rhino-two: charge on my mark. Engage and destroy all enemy forces. Watch for enemy infantry who might let you roll over their positions and engage you from the rear. Gunners, prepare for a close-in fight!”
As if to prove a point, a Pakistani large-caliber artillery shell landed at the edge of the road, showering his parked Arjun with sand and gravel. The shadow of the airborne gravel drifted over the tank against the blue sky above.
Kulkarni smiled cruelly: “charge!”
The tank jerked into motion and accelerated against the rising growl of the diesel engines. The main guns spoke up again and pummeled what remained of the few Pakistani infantry positions lined with trenches. They were now close enough to the position to see past it. Kulkarni and his crews got their first glimpse of what was behind the Pakistani lines. He could make out silhouettes of trucks and what appeared to be a box-shaped armored vehicle moving behind smoke…
“Gunner! Enemy M113 moving behind the lines! Five degrees off, seven-hundred meters!”
“I have it!”
The tank shuddered and the turret filled with smoke as the gunner let loose a high-explosive round. Kulkarni never took his eyes off the sights and saw the round fly almost horizontally and reach out like a finger of death to the boxy M113 personnel carrier. The latter exploded in a fireball and was shoved to the side of the road before it started bellowing thick, black smoke.
“Hit!” Kulkarni exclaimed.
The driver chimed in: “I see enemy soldiers moving to my left, three-hundred meters! I see some heavy weapons!”
The gunner swiveled the turret to the left. “I see them!”
Kulkarni heard the metallic snapping noises of the co-axial machineguns as they raked the enemy positions. The loader snapped the next high-explosive round into the gun in the meantime. The machinegun fire stopped for a couple seconds and the turret shook as the high-explosive round went on its way. The machinegun fire started up again and the cycle repeated as they prepared to overrun this first line of Pakistani defenses…
Kulkarni had other things to worry about than keeping an eye on his crew. They were a well-oiled team and didn’t need his constant supervision. But the rest of the taskforce did. He saw that several other tanks on his left and right were moving almost parallel to him as they approached the enemy lines. He also noticed that the Pakistani artillery had stopped fire now that rhino was literally on top of the defenders. The sixty-ton Indian tanks had less to worry about getting hit than the Pakistani infantry and thin-skinned APCs here. He noticed trucks behind the Pakistani defenses beginning to roll west with haste, abandoning their soldiers here. High-explosive rounds from rhino-four to the southwest slammed into the truck convoy with lethal effect. He could see the tank rounds slicing across his view left to right…