As Garger led his platoon through the area where C company and the Soviet tank company had been wiped out, he realized that he was seeing another aspect of war that he had so far missed: the aftermath. Up to this point, all his battles had been at long range. He had taken part in the run through the town of Arnsdorf with the CO during the defense of Hill 214, where they had been eyeball to eyeball with the Russians. But that action was fast, a blur of activity in a heated night action.
This was different. The slow movement of the Team through the battle area offered him ample opportunities to view the debris of battle more closely. There were the smashed vehicles, tanks, and PCs. Some burned fiercely while others showed no apparent damage, almost as if their crews had simply stopped their vehicles. It was the dead and the dying that were most unsettling. Here a tank crewman hung halfway out of a burning tank, his body blackened and burning. Over there a group of dead infantrymen who had abandoned their PC, cut down by the advancing Soviet tanks. Everywhere the lightly wounded were moving about, sorting out those who could be helped and those who were beyond help. Garger didn't want to watch. He wanted to turn away. But that was not possible. The horror of the scene had a fascination that held his attention.
The time span could not have been more than two minutes from when the firing in the valley to the west had stopped and the sound of advancing tanks coming from the east was detected. Polgar heard the squeak of the sprockets just as the forward security team he had sent out reported that there were tanks coming down the trail fast. Polgar had to remind them to report the type and number of tanks they were observing. Sheepishly, the NCO in charge of the security element reported three T-72s moving across an open area in the woods toward where Polgar had deployed the rest of the Platoon.
Instead of defending at the tree line where the security element was located, he had decided to set up deep in the woods where his people would have the greatest advantages and the tanks would be the most vulnerable and helpless. The Dragons would be worthless in this fight. The antitank guided missile they fired needed to fly some distance before the warhead armed. There wasn't enough standoff distance here for that to happen. This fight was going to be strictly man against tank at very close range. For this, the Mech Platoon was ready.
Polgar observed the tanks as they came. The tank commanders were up in the cupolas pushing their tanks forward for all they were worth. They did not seem to be concerned with security. The fact that the lead element had passed through these woods without incident apparently satisfied this group of Russian tankers that the trail was clear. Besides, they were hell-bent to join the lead element as fast as possible. In a twisted bit of humor, Polgar thought to himself as he watched the T-72s advance that all three would very soon be joining their comrades in the valley wherever good Communists go when they die.
Polgar and his men were far more relaxed as they waited to spring this ambush than they had been on Hill 214. The big Soviet tanks could be defeated. The men and the leaders in the Mech Platoon knew this now. They hadn't been too sure the first day or that night on the hill. They were veterans now, however, and knew what they could do. To some it was almost a contest, a challenge of sorts. Infantrymen were always trying to prove to tankers that they could easily do in their archrivals on the battlefield. The detonation of the first antitank mine was their cue to do so again. As the platoon went into action, there was nothing for Polgar to do. Every man had been briefed on his role and went into action as planned. Machine gunners and riflemen cut down the tank commanders before they could respond or drop down inside the tanks. Other infantrymen with light antitank rocket launchers, called LAWs, began to fire. One LAW is not enough to kill a tank. Sometimes it would take up to twelve LAWS before the tank died. Because of this Polgar had organized four-man tank killer teams under an NCO. Each man had several LAWs. The NCO would designate the target tank and fire. Each of the men would then fire in turn against the same tank. In this way, the first two tanks were rapidly dispatched.
The third tank, seeing the plight of the first two, began to back up. It didn't get far, however.
Two infantrymen, on opposite sides of the trail, pulled a mine attached to a rope onto the trail under the third tank as it backed up. The detonation destroyed the engine but did not kill the crew. The crew began to spray the woods indiscriminately with machine-gun fire in an effort to kill some of their unseen assailants.
A squad leader in charge of this area called for smoke. Several men threw grenades that erupted into billowing clouds of colored smoke. Once this smoke screen was thick enough to provide cover, the squad leader maneuvered his tank killer team into position behind the tank where he knew the turret would not be able to be turned on them. For several seconds the LAW gunners waited for the smoke to clear. Once they had a clear shot, the LAW gunners began to fire. First the NCO, then the next man. Then the third. At the range they were engaging from, no one was missing. The LAWS slammed into the crippled tank one after the other at a measured interval. As Polgar watched, he knew the third tank was doomed.
So did the crew of the tank. Deciding that there was no point in dying for the Motherland just for the sake of dying, they surrendered. The tank gunner stuck his hand up out of the commander's hatch and waved a white rag. Both Polgar and the NCO in charge of the LAW gunners ordered a cease-fire. This was something new. They were finally going to meet the enemy. A defeated enemy.
Once the firing stopped, the gunner slowly began to emerge. Looking around, he continued to climb out. When he saw the first American, he stopped and waved the white rag again, just to be sure. The gunner didn't move until the American signaled him to climb down. As he did so, the driver opened his hatch and climbed out and onto the ground.
The Russians were terrified. They were searched at gunpoint, their pistols and anything else that could be used as a weapon were stripped from them. While this search was in progress, an NCO climbed up to check out the tank commander and the rest of the tank.
When it was discovered that the tank commander was still alive, two more infantrymen climbed up and gave the NCO a hand, lowering the wounded Russian down and away from the tank while the medic was called. The Russian gunner and driver, seeing this, relaxed. The horror stories their political officers had told them about Americans killing prisoners were lies. They were safe. They would live.
As he worked on the wounded tank commander, the medic thought how ironic this was.
Less than two minutes ago everyone in the platoon was trying to kill this man. Now he was doing his damnedest to save the Russian's life. War was definitely screwed up. The medic hoped that someday someone would explain it all to him. But not right now. There was a man's life to save.
Bannon was in the process of gathering the commanders of Team Bravo and D company when Polgar reported the tanks. As soon as he heard about it, he ordered Uieski to take the Team's tanks up to the Mech Platoon's position. Once there he was to establish a defensive position blocking that trail with one tank platoon and the Mech Platoon and hold another tank platoon back as a reaction force.