That orderly retreat fell apart when the reinvigorated militia upped the pressure and charged their shattered defenses. All the repressed disaster and stress of the last few hours came back in a collective trauma. They surely put up an impressive fight, but they weren’t combat troops by temperament. They just weren’t used to this shit!
The final straw came when the Brads behind them began blasting apart unarmed trucks full of retreating men and women. A few hardcore small groups held up wherever seemed a little defensible and died to the last. Everyone else who didn’t have an immediate chance to escape threw down their weapons and raised their hands.
Despite the desperation of the fight and all the bad blood endeared, most were allowed to surrender. The occasional soldier had a smart-ass comment to offer the exhausted enemy. It was usually the last thing they ever said. Still, almost everyone that kept their mouth shut and arms high was rounded up safely.
The rest of the militia went full Rambo as they rampaged throughout the collapsing rear area supply and maintenance depots scattered across town. At the airport, some posed for photographs on top of an abandoned Blackhawk helicopter. In a Winn-Dixie parking lot, others spray painted obscene jokes on the sides of multi-million dollar mobile radars. The irregulars even cursed the president who was at that moment saving their lives.
Thirty miles north, a fresh, brigade-sized task force bore down on the burning town. The Georgia National Guard force couldn’t wait to avenge their slaughtered brethren. The details of the desertion disaster in Florida apparently changed a little bit before reaching the rank and file outside of the combat zone. In any case, they were willing and more than able to finish the job the regular Army started.
Fortunately, for the rebels, this president, who had never served in the military and sat 800 hundred miles away from the actors involved, did not trust the Georgians. Desperate to help and reading fragmentary reports, he believed he saw something the generals missed. Determined not to allow the enemy to receive further reinforcements, he called the unit directly. Entirely bypassing the chain of command in his ignorance.
The frustrated brigade, only minutes from Lake City, halted and reluctantly turned around. Their commander’s disrespectful, almost mutinous response to the order convinced the president he made the right call. This success, of course, only emboldened the president to “help” further.
Chapter 9
15 miles north of Lake City
General McDowell hadn’t been overwhelmed; he’d just been under fire. Now that his command post was far enough out of town that tracers couldn’t rip holes in his map anymore he could finally think. Despite the desperate retreat, made even worse with all those civilian tag-a-longs blocking the roads, he somehow managed to get his unwieldy command staff and vehicle park out of harm’s way. A shame the rest of the division’s support trail wasn’t so lucky.
McDowell came closest to sympathizing with the rebels when the president personally called back his Guard reserves over concerns about their loyalty. Which could not have been more ridiculous. Their commanding officer was a West Point classmate of his, for Christ’s sakes! The combined Georgia/Alabama BCT now streaming back across the border might not have arrived in time to prevent disaster, but they would’ve given him options at least. At the moment, that’s what he was shortest on.
All the doctrine called for establishing a forward operating base and concentrating his support assets there. It was the most efficient way to supply his combat maneuver units while maintaining a minimum of security elements. A base in Lake City had seemed by-the-book perfect. Centrally located, with its own airfield and natural defenses that would channel attacking forces into narrow avenues. Just what doctrine called for, even if things turned out so terribly. Problem was, none of the field manuals held a solution for your own people turning on you or your president micromanaging the battle.
At least his requests for more aircraft hadn’t fallen on deaf ears. Unfortunately, the White House’s several hour delay, while they debated and dithered and hoped the situation would magically “clarify itself,” resulted in the unnecessary deaths of God knew how many federal troops. They were either unable or unwilling to wrap their minds around the air losses he’d suffered, and those were just a scratch compared to the ground casualties. He shook his head and pushed the thought down. It was time to extract the rest of his units.
On paper, they were screwed. Scattered, surrounded, cut off and under pressure from every side… Things looked bleak. Reality wasn’t as bad as that. The rebels holding Lake City didn’t appear to have any lust to leave the safety of town and fight out in the open. The Air Force’s now regular bombing runs helped to encourage that point of view. As for the regular rebel forces to his south, even after the losses his men suffered he outnumbered them easily 2 to 1.
The enemy had clearly suffered as well. Not nearly as bad, but they were so much smaller to begin with. Their cohesiveness must be nearing its limits. This was more than wishful thinking. Judging by how the enemy’s aggressiveness tapered off, and how little interest they seemed to have in finishing off his trapped units, they were probably at the end of their endurance as well.
The only success they’d enjoyed so far was being able to concentrate whole brigades against his individual battalions. Like so many senior leaders in the military or civilian world, he just chalked that up to bad luck and ignored the large role he played.
To the general’s credit, he didn’t cry over spilled milk. He began carefully extracting his maneuver units back north. With dark setting in, they were finally able to break contact with the National Guard forces clinging to them like so many ticks. From what they could tell, the rebels were terribly short on night vision and thermal imaging gear. If only they could be shorter on luck.
Back in town, when watching those armed civilians swarm over his base like a zombie horde, he’d fantasized about recalling his combat forces and stomping them out. It wouldn’t take long. As much as it stung, he was professional enough to realize that wasn’t the answer.
Those tanks and infantrymen might be too powerful to be overrun, but they sure wouldn’t be overrunning anyone else anytime soon. For the time being, he had no way to supply them. No minor inconvenience, since three modern brigades required an endless train of supplies to stay dangerous. The only solution was to get back across the nearby friendly border, or friendly enough border. They had to regroup, rearm and reorganize as soon as possible. The temptation to step on these irregulars on the way out of state was powerful, but it would have to wait a little.
No, the only logical, sound tactical decision was to retreat, no matter how much that pissed Washington off. He’d already stopped answering their calls. All the insane requests were funneled through trusted subordinates that could stall for time. He would have had his staff tell them he was dead, but then one of those armchair generals might try to take charge themselves. Though, how could that be any different from the current command structure?
Los Padres National Forest, California
Pop, pop, click.
Shit. Sophie had lost track of how many rounds were left. She slid out the magazine, locked the bolt to the rear and rested her peacemaker on the sandbags in front of her. Fighting the itch to stand up, she pushed the oversized helmet as far out of the way as she dared. Her instructor noticed; he caught everything, but let it go. He had a bigger annoyance. Everyone else on the line but her still carefully pumped out rounds downrange.