“They’ll not get past us, sir.”
“We’ll see. We have a Fox armoured car joining us. When it turns up, guide them to the hedge line left of our position.”
“The intersection between us and Three-Platoon?”
“Yes, it’s our weakest point. Then get on to One-Section. I want yours and their Saxons brought up to the hedge line as well.”
“Use their Gympys?”
“And there’s extra ammo.”
“I’ll get onto it now then, sir.”
Cox turned to his runner. “Chase the CSM up on that resupply.”
“Sir.”
The lieutenant rested his elbows on the sandbags along the eastern edge of the firing position. It was quiet in the local area, although he was sure he could hear the occasional rumble of an engine as the Soviet BMDs got into position to make an assault on their location. He was sure there were more than the six that had been spotted. And now it seemed Soviet airborne were attacking the troops along the River Weser. That was no more than seven kilometres away. If the Soviets secured a bridgehead, and an armoured spearhead managed to cross the river, there wouldn’t be much of 2nd Division left in this area to stop them.
His OC, Major Brooks, had hinted at there being a bigger picture. He remembered seeing Chieftain tanks further to the rear when he had been to the Brigade headquarters for a briefing. Some were undergoing repairs, and others rearming and refuelling. For the second part of the briefing, the commander of 15th Infantry Brigade had dismissed them, allowing only battalion commanders and above to remain behind. One other incident had stuck in his mind. An American officer had been attached to the Brigade as a liaison officer. But, there were no American units in the area, or so he thought.
He looked behind him as he heard the growl of the Fox’s Jaguar engine. The sergeant in command of this vehicle, and another like it attaching itself to Two-Platoon, would give them a little more firepower. With the 30mm RARDEN cannon, along with the machine guns from the Saxons, they would give the Soviets a run for their money. The BMDs would also have to face the two Milan firing posts attached to One and Two-Sections, along with two more with One-Platoon. Behind them, one of the batteries from the 101st Northumbria Field Artillery Regiment would also be preparing their shells to give the advancing enemy some more to think about.
Chapter 33
The team waited patiently for a gap in the traffic. At one point, the convoys going west had been almost stationary — it was moving that slowly. They appeared to be fuel tankers and ammunition carriers in the main. A fantastic target, thought Sergeant Jackson. He was slightly worried. Dawn was rapidly approaching, and daylight would make it easier for the drivers to see the deadly blobs laid across the road. Keeping out of sight, he looked down both directions of the road and could see a gap about to appear. He ordered the team to split. Sergeant Jackson and Corporal Simmons gathered their deadly packages and, on his command, after the last vehicle driving west had passed them, sprinted across. Sergeant Jackson headed for the other side of the dual carriageway while Corporal Simmons laid his mines on the southern stretch. Vaughan headed east and Perry west to get to prepare to set off the LAW off-route mines. The ambush was set. Hannoversche Strasse, Route 65, had now become a death trap for the enemy.
Their final preparations complete, Jackson went west to join Perry, avoiding the anti-personnel mines that had been set, and Simmons went east to wait with Vaughan.
They didn’t have to wait long as vehicles from both directions, having a free road ahead of them, drove at a speed of sixty kilometres per hour and ploughed straight into the mines. The front of the first, a Zil-131, was lifted off the ground and flipped over, its momentum forcing it to continue on its journey, the vehicle sliding down the bank 100 metres further on. Behind it, a second Zil, attempting to avoid the vehicle in front of it before it careered off the road, turned right to pass it, hitting another one of the explosive traps. The driver of the vehicle behind, failing to follow the requirement of keeping a fifty-metre gap between convoy vehicles, stood on the brakes, but only succeeded in slowing the inevitable collision with the vehicle in front. On the opposite lane, a similar event was occurring, but one of the trucks was carrying aviation fuel for the Soviet helicopters and erupted in a ball of flame. As the convoys on both sides of the road ground to a halt, the four men unleashed the off-route mines, destroying an armoured BRDM-2 and two further trucks. The fourth failed to fire. But it would be some time before the Soviets sorted out the mess.
It was time to go.
The eight men from 22 Special Air Service Regiment watched from their place of concealment as a small convoy of trucks approached the bridge from the west. They were Ural-375 fuel bowsers, needed to feed the ever-hungry armoured units of the Soviet Army. The trucks going east were empty, but their destruction would still be missed. They were badly needed to pick up more supplies to feed the fuel-hungry Soviet divisions.
The charge demolition necklace was in place. It was time. The team leader pointed at his watch and hit the detonation switch. Seconds later, the wedge-shaped hollow charges that had been placed each side of a selected girder and clipped together, exploded. The hot force of the ‘Hayrick’ charges cut through the steel of the girders as if they were butter. The centre of the bridge lifted, flinging vehicles into the kerb and up against the railings, before dropping back down and collapsing, falling to the depths below, taking vehicles and some of the sentries with it. Another thorn had just been pierced in the enemy’s side.
The eight men pulled out, their job done, but their work was far from complete. They had a second mission to perform.
It was time to hit back a second time.
The six missiles, launched moments earlier from the British 50th Missile Regiment, flew through the air at a speed greater than Mach 3. Six missiles, each one carrying an M251 warhead loaded with high-explosive sub munitions, struck the advanced elements of the attacking forces when they were less than three-kilometres from 2nd Infantry Division’s second line of defence. The Soviet 12th Guards Tank Division, urged on by their masters, had gone for a narrow front, hitting the seven-kilometre gap between Minden and Petershagen. The Soviets had bombarded the 2nd Battalion, Yorkshire Volunteers, who had been given a three-kilometre stretch north of Minden to defend, with a forty-five-minute deluge of high explosives, and a significant air-to-ground strike. Following it up with an entire air assault battalion landing directly behind them. Although the 4th Battalion (Volunteers), the Parachute Regiment, defending the line north of the Yorkshire volunteers, had managed to release a company to send in support of the beleaguered battalion, it was soon mauled by Soviet Hind and Hip attack helicopters and went to ground. By then, it was too late and, within an hour, Soviet amphibious vehicles, K-61s carrying troops and heavy amphibious pontoons, along with GSPs carrying armoured vehicles, 12th Guards Division crossed the Weser. The minute a bridgehead was secured, the Soviet bridging units with their PMP pontoons were rushed forward under an umbrella of Soviet fighter aircraft. The speed at which the floating bridge was erected defied all records, and from the first pontoon unfolding in a splash into the waters and the first BMP-2 crossing to the other side, only forty minutes had passed.