Stupid Luck and Happenstance, Thread III

[Tamarind77]

Unit design is interesting. Like, it says a lot about the doctrine of the army it's attached to. Like, each piece of kit is multiple kilograms that need to be lugged around, another link in the logistical chain, another link in the training pipeline, etc etc. Every piece of kit is hemmed and hawed over by wargaming divisions and command staff until it's been beaten to death.

Like compare a US platoon. There's no knee-mortars because it's pretty much accepted that with ubiquitous air support, there's no need to weigh your soldiers down with enormous amounts of kit. 1 M249 MG, 1-2 M320A1 Grenade launchers, everyone else with an M4A1 Carbine. Add 1 MG or minus 1 Grenade Launcher depending on the squad role.

Australia understanding we have less in the way of constant air support to make up for lack of artillery or aircraft, have 2MG, 2 grenade launchers, 2 LAWs/Gustavs per squad. Note the increased explosives to make up for lack of direct-impact aircraft munitions.

China meanwhile assumes (weirdly) it's going to fight a guerilla war (forgetting they're a major army), and weighs its guys down with the most kit of any military on the planet. Multiple grenade launchers, machine guns, rocket launchers, etc.

A platoon for Germany with 1 knee mortar at the command level, with squads including; 1 MG, and 2 grenadiers as standard, is actually identical to a US squad. If the US is still using a WW2 configuration, they're going with 12 men, 9 riflemen, 2 grenadiers and 1 MG. Overall, it's pretty much the same as a US squad. Which then raises the question of why the US troopers think the Germans have more firepower comparatively.

It's probably all loaded at the Platoon (command squad) level .

 

[Peabody-Martini]

Chapter Two Thousand Seven Hundred and Twenty-One



24th September 1978

Da Nang, Vietnam

Over the last several days, Tyrone Lee had been totally bewildered by what he had seen in the port city. Like every other Asian city he had been in, it was a kaleidoscope of neon lights and closely packed humanity. In Da Nang though there was a manic energy about the place. It put Lee in mind of accounts of New Orleans during Marti Gras or that strange Summer Arts Festival that consumed San Francisco every year.

Now though, the fun and games were over. The German Company he was with was preparing to go back to… Lee wasn’t quite sure what this was. It wasn’t a war. Supposedly their orders were to assist their Dutch Allies and to bring a rouge’s gallery of known pirates to justice. Lee had seen what their idea of justice looked like and figured that if anything they spared the Dutch the expense of a trial.

Lee had noticed something odd as he had watched the 1st Platoon fall in at the direction of Leutnant Raeder. There were forty men in the Platoon and their gear wasn’t that different from what would have been expected of a comparable Marine Platoon back in the States. There were the oddities like the light mortar that they had reverse engineered from the Japanese and improved for their own use, mostly the option of using a bipod if they wanted to take the time to set it up. Or the Panzerfaust 400 which they joked about being the ultimate doorknocker when it wasn’t being used on Russian tanks. Still that didn’t explain all the stories that he had heard about the German Military being able to put staggering amount of fire on a target. If he had to guess, it was because of US Army Observers encountering the G44 and MG42/56 a couple decades earlier when the US had nothing comparable. Lee wondered if a Company of Marine Riflemen could do the same things in the field as he had seen their German counterparts do if they ever got the chance.

The other development was that someone had decided that the German Marines needed to improve their intelligence gathering capabilities. Four specialists had been sent. Everyone said that they were from the Sealions which Lee understood were the equivalent of Marine Recon Units who were constantly fighting for their existence with every round of Military Appropriations in the US Congress.

These men were different though.

Lee had seen references for years about how there were some men who oozed danger. That was exactly what these guys did once you got past their scruffy appearance. They were commanded by a Sergeant with the other three being of Ranks that were the equivalent of Corporal or Lance Corporal. It had taken Lee some time, but he had figured out the system of sideways promotions that the Germans used. It wasn’t that different from the Specialist Ranks that was used in the US Military.

Finally, there was Leutnant Raeder who was preoccupied with a letter that he had received a week prior. He said that he was trying to figure out how to respond to without getting himself keelhauled. When Lee had asked if the German Navy still did that sort of thing, he had been told that there was always the sort of situation where an exception could be made. Especially if anyone from the Marine Infantry was involved.



Montreal, Canada

There had been times like this too often over the last few years. When Patricia Lane had been touched by her daughter’s efforts at the same time she wanted to strangle her. That had been Patricia’s reaction when she saw the photograph that Henriette had brought back from her trip to Germany. There was Sabastian Schultz sleeping on a couch with Alice in his arms and a little brown dog on Alice’s lap. It was perfectly adorable. Apparently, the dog was Terrier mix named Sprocket who belonged to Sophie Sommers. Henriette said that Sophie was the ward of Katherine von Mischner and that was whose house they had been staying in while Henriette had been attending an event that she had been invited to in Berlin.

As if it wasn’t already clear before, Henriette had fallen in love with Sabastian, and he was good with Alice. The trouble was that he lived on the far side of the Atlantic and Patricia could see that her daughter could easily make the same sorts of mistakes that she had in the past. Then there was the event that Henriette had been invited to. She had seen it as something of a lark, but Patricia had recognized that it was a function of the highest level of the German Imperial Court. Henriette had just seen that Suga had been nice to her, and that Marie Alexandra was a sworn friend and companion of the Kaiserin, which was the stated reason for the invitation. Henriette seemed to have no idea how deep the water she had found herself in was and when Patricia had tried to talk to her about it, Henriette had taken it all wrong.

“Daddy won’t need the shotgun if that is what you are getting at” Henriette had snapped before stomping off. Patricia knew that Henriette still had a year left at University, perhaps she would have figured out a thing or three before May rolled around.

 

[jlckansas]

Henriette doesn't need to worry about Daddy getting the shotgun, he knows who Sebastian is. That means one of two things:
1. He like him and approves of him.
2. He decides he needs backup and brings a full SAS/SBS team with a squadron of ground attack on call and if possible a battery of heavy artillery, that or he just calls Kat and talks with her about his "Future" son in law.

 

[Darth_Kiryan]

@Peabody-Martini
Just curious, but I'm wondering what the Bush family is up too at the moment.
As far as I remember, the daughter lives with her daddy whilst George W lives with his mother, and both retook the name Pierce - which I just found out is apart of the Freanklin Pierce family....

 

[Dan]

that or he just calls Kat and talks with her about his "Future" son in law.

I think Burt will speak to Malcolm first. Then it will be a conversation with the current head of Canadian intelligence about conflict of interests and whether this is deliberate targeting of Canadian Intelligence officers, (it will be laughed at, but first Douglas and Kat, now Henriette and Sebastian, if a third happens, then alarm bells will start to ring, even though it is literally Stupid Luck and Happenstance), then Burt will speak to Kat for a character reference so he knows exactly who Seb is before Seb walks into Burt's office to seek her Father's permission...

 

[Salamander]

Finally, there was Leutnant Raeder who was preoccupied with a letter that he had received a week prior. He said that he was trying to figure out how to respond to without getting himself keelhauled. When Lee had asked if the German Navy still did that sort of thing, he had been told that there was always the sort of situation where an exception could be made. Especially if anyone from the Marine Infantry was involved.

Who the hell wrote that letter? Because it sounds as if Eric is regarding it as if it was a grenade, or a cobra.

As if it wasn’t already clear before, Henriette had fallen in love with Sabastian, and he was good with Alice. The trouble was that he lived on the far side of the Atlantic and Patricia could see that her daughter could easily make the same sorts of mistakes that she had in the past. Then there was the event that Henriette had been invited to. She had seen it as something of a lark, but Patricia had recognized that it was a function of the highest level of the German Imperial Court. Henriette had just seen that Suga had been nice to her, and that Marie Alexandra was a sworn friend and companion of the Kaiserin, which was the stated reason for the invitation. Henriette seemed to have no idea how deep the water she had found herself in was and when Patricia had tried to talk to her about it, Henriette had taken it all wrong.

In many ways, Henriette is the same position as Doug was when he courted and married Kat, only without the chance of getting accidentally gutted with a karambit. She is also in a similar position to Margot in regards to the blindness to the nature of Court life, although in Margot's case it morphed into wilful refusal after Kira kerb-stomped her. This probably has much to do with being a citizen of one of the Commonwealth Realms. We might still be kingdoms, but we don't really hold all that courtly fru-fru crap in high regard. If Henriette ever does realise what her relationships with Bas and Marie have inducted her into, her reaction will probably be embarrassed surprise, closely followed by a variation of "OMG, I can't believe I said that to her! Why didn't you stop me?!". In her defence however, both Marie and Bas have, to an extent, downplayed their actual ranks and status, as have their respective families whenever Henriette has met them, mostly because they still act as if they still didn't have that rank and status.

think Burt will speak to Malcolm first. Then it will be a conversation with the current head of Canadian intelligence about conflict of interests and whether this is deliberate targeting of Canadian Intelligence officers, (it will be laughed at, but first Douglas and Kat, now Henriette and Sebastian, if a third happens, then alarm bells will start to ring, even though it is literally Stupid Luck and Happenstance), then Burt will speak to Kat for a character reference so he knows exactly who Seb is before Seb walks into Burt's office to seek her Father's permission...

These conversations have already taken place at Sir Malcolm's home during and immediately after the Montreal Olympics. Sir Malcolm, Henriette's father Bert, Tilo and Kat got together to 'talk shop' and the then nascent relationship between Bas and Henriette was discussed.

 

[Peabody-Martini]

Chapter Two Thousand Seven Hundred and Twenty-Two



25th September 1978

Da Nang, Vietnam

Oberfeld Muller said that Erich should just chuck the letter like he did with the last letter he received from his father months ago and pretend that he had never seen it. It just wasn’t that simple though. It wouldn’t be too difficult to trace just where that letter had gone, and Erich figured that Pastor Metzger would throw him to the wolves without a second thought.

The letter had seemed pretty inane on its face. It was from a sixteen-year-old girl named Gretchen who was attending a boarding school in the middle of nowhere in rural Lower Silesia and she spent much of the letter complaining about her lot in life. She said that her mother had made her come to school this year after attending a Progressive Gymnasia in Berlin for the last few years. In the letter, Gretchen had glossed over an incident that had apparently convinced her mother that having her being left more or less unattended for much of the day was not working for any of them. Now she was attending a school that she hated with her older sister Anna who was the popular girl. So, she was forced to spend all her time with the school outcasts, Mathilda, who was an unapologetic Heathen, and Mathilda’s friend Eddi.

As part of a school project, she had been required to write the letter. Both her grandfathers had been in the Military during the First World War. Luftwaffe and US Army, respectively. Erich had figured that there was probably an interesting story behind that. Her father was in the Marine Infantry, having been in every conflict that the Marines that been involved with since the Pacific War. That was the reason why Gretchen had been born in Korea. So, she had requested for the letter to be sent to someone in the Marine Infantry if that was possible. It was when Erich saw the signature on the bottom that he had realized the shit he was in, Gretchen Eun-Ji Schultz. It had only taken a small amount of asking around to confirm that Gretchen Schultz was the daughter of Marine Infantry Generalfeldmarschall Dietrich “Tilo” Schultz, currently the Deputy Commander in Chief of the Naval High Command in Kiel. If Erich failed to handle this properly it didn’t take too much imagination to figure that something unspeakable would happen to him.

Rolling a fresh sheet of paper into the typewriter, Erich figured that that a typewritten letter would be impersonal enough to keep him out of hot water so long as he kept the language neutral. He thought for a long moment before starting.

To Gretchen

My name is Leutnant Erich Johann Albert Freiherr von Raeder IV of Infanterie Regiment Nr.7 of 3. Marine Infanterie-Abteilung Cuxhaven. Like you I come from a family with a long history of service, as I am sure you can guess from my name. I can understand your feelings about being sent away from home for school. I was sent to the Royal Prussian Institute in Groß-Lichterfelde when I was eleven before transferring to the Mürwik Naval School the instant I came became eligible shortly after turning sixteen…

Erich could remember when he had been told that transfer had been approved. It remained one of the few times he could remember his father being happy with him. It had been at Mürwik that he’d had the growing sense of unease that he was following in the exact footsteps of his father and grandfather who had failed to live up to the example of his storied great grandfather. That was what had ultimately caused him to volunteer for the Marine Infantry despite being in the top third of his class. It was something that was unexpected. Turning back to the letter, Erich tried his best to explain who he was without saying too much about what he was doing or where he was doing it. When he dropped this in the mail, it would get loaded onto the first transport home. Gretchen would receive it within a few days. He just hoped that the letter was neutral enough to avoid her father’s wrath.



Montreal, Canada

It was moments like this these where Henriette missed having Marie Alexandra around. Marie would have known the exact thing to say yesterday when Henriette’s mother had basically asked if she had gotten pregnant again in a roundabout way. Fortunately, Henriette knew for certain that she wasn’t. Not that she entirely objected to the idea of Alice having a little brother or sister eventually, most certainly not now. She and Sabastian had been extremely careful in that regard. Which had turned out to be far easier to do because he wasn’t a selfish prick. Unlike someone else who Henriette never wanted to see again.

There had also been questions about if she understood just what roles Sabastian and Marie played in Germany? Henriette knew what they had told her and that the two of them were a bit embarrassed by the ceremonial aspect of the German Court that they were sometimes expected to take part in. They were of what were called New Junkers Families, meaning that their families had gained lands and titles as a result of Military Service in the World Wars as the Old Junkers Families had been decimated by those same conflicts. Sabastian said that his grandparents had originally been from a tiny farming village in Bavaria and Marie’s German grandfather had been some sort of Mafioso who she never talked about at all.

Mostly, what Henriette had seen when she gone to visit Marie at the house on Langeoog in the East Frisian Islands was that it was a place where Marie felt completely free to indulge in her eccentricities. Later, when she had gone with Marie to that meeting in Berlin she had seen underneath the veneer of formality that her friend had put up. Marie was more than guarded at that event, more like she was in a defensive stance waiting to strike. Her mother had suggested that it had involved politics without elaborating.

 

[Peabody-Martini]

One minor detail. Gretchen Schultz is also Karl Dunkel's cousin, so it might not have been an accident that Erich was the one who got that letter.

 

[ejpsan]

Mrs. Lane still thinks that her daughter is the very naive little girl that got sweet talked into a life altering situation with major consequences, but Henrietta has grown especially with the help of her good friend Marie.
Plus Sebastian Schultz has truly transformed himself from the immature prankster that he was, into a world class athlete who is very accepting of Alice, and more importantly not judging the circumstances of Henriette's life.
I think that it is more likely that Henriette will choose to go to Germany to be with Bas, than Bas choosing to go to Canada with Henriette.

Would like to know what Gretchen did that made her get sent back to her own personal Hell known as that boarding school where her "Evil" sister still lords it over everyone.
Hopefully this time around Gretchen will take advantage of the situation and becomes friends with Mathilda and Eddi.

Erich needs to keep everything vague and generic in his letters back to Gretchen, while making sure that absolutely no hint of criticism of his superior officers is in the letters.
I doubt that Gretchen is going to share the contents of the letters that she receives from Erich with her father, but with Anna around I could see trouble coming from that direction.

 

[Dan]

Erich saw the signature on the bottom that he had realized the shit he was in, Gretchen Eun-Ji Schultz. It had only taken a small amount of asking around to confirm that Gretchen Schultz was the daughter of Marine Infantry Generalfeldmarschall Dietrich “Tilo” Schultz, currently the Deputy Commander in Chief of the Naval High Command in Kiel.

"Lt Reader, why have you volunteered for underwater mine disposal duties? You have none of the required training".

"I am looking for a role that is safer than writing to my assigned pen pal"...

Poor Erich.
Of course, when he gets back to Kiel, he could well find Tilo wanting to meet the "characterless, cold fish that has been writing to me Papa".

That would be both wildly terrifying and hilarious.

 

[Salamander]

It was when Erich saw the signature on the bottom that he had realized the shit he was in, Gretchen Eun-Ji Schultz. It had only taken a small amount of asking around to confirm that Gretchen Schultz was the daughter of Marine Infantry Generalfeldmarschall Dietrich “Tilo” Schultz, currently the Deputy Commander in Chief of the Naval High Command in Kiel. If Erich failed to handle this properly it didn’t take too much imagination to figure that something unspeakable would happen to him.

Sergeant Lee: "Why does Leutnant Raeder look like he's seen a ghost?"
Oberfeld Muller: "Because he has. Literally."
Lee: "What do you mean?"
Muller: "He received a letter from the Student Penpal program."
Lee: "And?"
Muller: "It was written by the 16 year old daughter of Marine Infantry Generalfeldmarschall Dietrich Shultz."
Lee: "Ooohhhh!"
Muller: "Ja, our leutnant is a dead man walking."


Erich (while typing): Surely Antarctica can't be that bad?

 

[Hoyahoo9]

It had only taken a small amount of asking around to confirm that Gretchen Schultz was the daughter of Marine Infantry Generalfeldmarschall Dietrich “Tilo” Schultz

Erich's reaction to this realization brings to mind the scene P-M wrote so many, many chapters ago when Kat's brother Hans first realizes (with horror) who Helene's father is.

 

[Peabody-Martini]

Chapter Two Thousand Seven Hundred and Twenty-Three



2nd October 1978

Tzschocha, Silesia

Looking in her mailbox, Gretchen saw that she had gotten mail today. The stamp on the letter said that it had come all the way from Vietnam along with additional stamps from the Air Fleet Command, the aviation branch of the Kaiserliche Marine. She had not been expecting a response so soon. Part of a Civics assignment that she would be graded for at the end of School Term had been to start this correspondence and she had not been thrilled with the idea. That was why she had filled the letter she had mailed almost a month earlier with complaints that she was a bit embarrassed about.

Gretchen had still been smarting about how her parents had sprung her attending the Tzschocha Gymnasia on her towards the end of the Summer Holiday. The stated reason had been the incident months earlier that she had thought had blown over. They had told her that when Anna was going back to Tzschocha, Gretchen was going with her. Her father had used that tone that said far more than the words he had used. The tone that said that no amount of arguing or pleading would do Gretchen any good.

This was all because Gretchen’s curiosity had gotten the better of her after she had come home from school and found that her mother had business elsewhere and she would need to take care of herself for a few hours. Normally, she would have worked on her homework or watched television in situations like that. Instead she had gotten into her parent’s liquor cabinet that afternoon, which had turned out to be a profound mistake.

While her parents in the past had done their best to let her and Anna try wine and beer in what they said was a healthy manner, it had always been very controlled. Gretchen had been left wondering what the appeal was. The bottle of Plum-Sloe Obstler she had sampled had not been what she had been expecting, and she had gotten caught after things had gotten out of hand. Gretchen had found it impossible to deny what had happened when her mother was demanding to know what was going on when her vision had been swimming as she stood on unsteady feet, then her mother found the mostly empty bottle. That had resulted in having her mother yelling at her later, all about how what she had done was extremely dangerous while she had been violently ill. That should have been all the punishment she had needed.

Her parents had other ideas.

Getting in line for lunch, Gretchen fought the urge to open the letter while she waited. Not that lunch was particularly worth the wait. Vegetables, mostly cabbage and potatoes but with the occasional bits of carrot, and the mystery meat which was supposedly beef in onion broth served with rye bread. At least that was what it purported to be, there were some serious questions about that. As a treat today there were slices of fresh apricot, which Gretchen had discovered something that very rarely occurred. She found Gretchen and Eddi sitting at their usual spot at the table that was furthest from the one where all the cool girls gathered. Like always, Gretchen could see Anna holding court across the hall.

Mathilda was picking at her food and while it wasn’t in her nature to complain, she clearly didn’t like most of what they were served day to day. Breakfast was better, but the oatmeal that was served most days was sort of hard to mess up. On Sundays there were other options like eggs or a waffle if the Cook was feeling generous, but you had to get to the dining hall early if you wanted that. Eddi was already though reading the newspaper today and had switched to working on the crossword. The day before, someone had put a frog in Eddi’s bed. Mathilda and Eddi had said that they suspected that Anna was up to her old ways. Making fun of Eddi because her real name, Edmée, was French was something that Anna had done for years and while she had backed off somewhat she had learned to be a bit discrete, which wasn’t good for any of them. Mathilda said that the thing with the frog was exactly the sort of thing that Anna would do. Gretchen understood exactly where they coming from. She had dealt her older sister far longer then they had.

Opening the letter, Gretchen read the typewritten page and it seemed rather impersonal to her, just who he was. If she had to guess, Erich had figured out who her father was and had done that on purpose. The truth was that unless he had filled it with specific lewd comments, her father wouldn’t have had too much of a problem with it. He’d always had a soft spot for the men who were a part of his old unit. Gretchen didn’t know which Regiment he had been in when he had first been in the Marine Infantry, it would probably be a good idea to ask about that.

“What do you have there?” Eddi asked.

“Part of a Civics project” Gretchen replied, “Write a letter to a soldier.”

“I did that last year” Mathilda said, “I never got a response, but I still got credit for the project.”

Gretchen wasn’t surprised. For Mathilda things like that seemed to come easy. She had read all the textbooks that dealt with History or Literature in the first few weeks of the term. Math and Science were a bit more challenging for her, but not by as much as you would think. Gretchen found it astonishing that Mathilda had never set foot in a classroom before she had started at Tzschocha.

 

[ejpsan]

Mathilda, Eddi, and Gretchen are not going to be a new version of "The Three Furies", but are going to be friends with each other because they are the only ones who would be friends with them, as basically no one else would be.
Mathilda, after the death of her beloved Opa, is finding out that living a solitary life has little appeal for her, and that is why she didn't chase Eddi off after Eddie started to hang around her.
Eddi's parents apparently don't want her around them, and it seems that many of the other girls at the school has picked up on that, and are using that to attack her, sees Mathilda as a fellow outcast and as a fellow outcast, it is her duty to be friends with Mathilda.
Gretchen is dealing with the fallout of her " Prudish out of touch American born mother who made a big deal over a little bit of alcohol " and her Queen B sister, just gravitated to Mathilda and Eddi because they were the only ones to let her sit with them at meal together.

 

[Peabody-Martini]

Mathilda, Eddi, and Gretchen are not going to be a new version of "The Three Furies", but are going to be friends with each other because they are the only ones who would be friends with them, as basically no one else would be.

Even if it is just them sticking together to have a companion on the lifeboat, it is still a genuine friendship.

Eddi's parents apparently don't want her around them, and it seems that many of the other girls at the school has picked up on that, and are using that to attack her, sees Mathilda as a fellow outcast and as a fellow outcast, it is her duty to be friends with Mathilda.

Some people just don't want to be parents and their children can pay a price for that. At the same time, Mathilda has inadvertently invited Eddi to join her own adopted family.

Gretchen is dealing with the fallout of her " Prudish out of touch American born mother who made a big deal over a little bit of alcohol " and her Queen B sister, just gravitated to Mathilda and Eddi because they were the only ones to let her sit with them at meal together.

Gretchen's mother, Nancy Jensen, has had her own issues with alcohol. Small wonder she would be alarmed by seeing one of her own children engaging in the same sort of behavior. As for Anna, the Queen Bee older sister, it probably shouldn't come as a surprise that most of her relationships are transactional. People like that are seldom happy.

 

[ejpsan]

Even if it is just them sticking together to have a companion on the lifeboat, it is still a genuine friendship.

Some people just don't want to be parents and their children can pay a price for that. At the same time, Mathilda has inadvertently invited Eddi to join her own adopted family.

Gretchen's mother, Nancy Jensen, has had her own issues with alcohol. Small wonder she would be alarmed by seeing one of her own children engaging in the same sort of behavior. As for Anna, the Queen Bee older sister, it probably shouldn't come as a surprise that most of her relationships are transactional. People like that are seldom happy.

Forgot about Nancy's binge drinking problem during the time she was working for the US Department of State under Paul Finley.
BTW whatever happened to Paul Finley, last time we heard anything about him he was working in the archives department?
But still, Nancy apparently has the same attitude towards minors and alcohol that many American parents have, and that has led to the tendency of many young Americans to indulge in binge drinking during the weekends instead of moderating their intake.

 

[Rinasoir]

Even if it is just them sticking together to have a companion on the lifeboat, it is still a genuine friendship.

Nothing builds bonds like shared misery.

 

[Dan]

Nothing builds bonds like shared misery.

Can confirm.

 

[matzeskatze]

But still, Nancy apparently has the same attitude towards minors and alcohol that many American parents have, and that has led to the tendency of many young Americans to indulge in binge drinking during the weekends instead of moderating their intake.

While her parents in the past had done their best to let her and Anna try wine and beer in what they said was a healthy manner, it had always been very controlled.

I wouldn't say that this is "typical American" more as I understand it "typical German". But the child had to do stupid stuff and get drunk... so less on the parents for dangeling the forbidden fruit so to say and more the stupidity of youth.
And if it happens once and she learns from it... well I'd say it is a bottle well spent. As there were no reprecussions like car accidents and injuries.

 

[Peabody-Martini]

Chapter Two Thousand Seven Hundred and Twenty-Four



14th October 1978

Palanro, South Sulawesi

It had been figured that they would be operating in a densely populated section of the coast. So, everyone had gotten a crash refresher on how they conducted themselves when there were civilians in close proximity. As it had turned out, that refresher had not been necessary. Instead, as the sun rose over the mountains of Sulawesi, Erich found himself in a draw trying to keep as low as possible as bullets zipped past only centimeters above.

The hills above Palanro were around four hundred meters in height. The Oberst who commanded the Regiment was solid enough, he just lacked the imagination to see how those hills would pose a problem shortly after they had landed.

It had started a couple days earlier when Intelligence had identified a ship that had been reported missing the prior week being offloaded at the pier in Palanro. Supposedly it wasn’t considered a deep-water port, so someone on the other side had figured that it wasn’t a place where anyone would be looking. Even so, someone must have figured that they would make an appearance eventually because there were what sounded like a high velocity 7.5 or 8cm guns dug into the hills and the mission to seize the ship had been forgotten with them tasked with eliminating the guns as the ships of their flotilla moved to get out of range after the ship’s own guns had not been effective.

The steep, rugged hills covered in heavy forest were great if you were defending and pure Hell for everyone else. Erich found this out as his Platoon had come under increasing fire the closer to the hilltops they got. Luckily the Heavy Weapons Company had moved up and they were bombarding the hilltop with 8cm mortars. The 20mm DP Flak guns that were meant to provide direct fire support if asked, had not been as useful but Erich had heard the jackhammer sound of the 20mm guns a few times as they had found a worthwhile target.

Only minutes earlier, Erich had been yelling into the handset of backpack radio which connected to the encoded Strategic Network. The 12.8cm guns on the Ozelot and the Weißer Thun could easily out distance the guns on the hilltop, at least lob in some high explosive shells. Whoever he was talking to said that they needed to be prepared for any other surprises, so he was to make do with what he had. It was incredibly easy for them to say that when they didn’t have bullets flying just over their heads. It had only been a few minutes later that the Platoon had found themselves pinned down by what sounded like an old Nambu machine gun. It seemed that the Revolutionaries turned Pirates were not about to let a perfectly good machine gun go to waste, especially because it was still perfectly suited for the area denial mission that it was being put to.

Looking to his right, Erich saw that Muller was sheltering behind a tree trunk. It looked absurdly like something from a schoolboys playing war, which Erich found infuriating. Was this some sort of stupid game? In the corner of his eye Erich saw someone turn to run and heard the dull thud! of a bullet hitting a body as soon as he stood up.

How many times in training had Erich heard the Drill Instructor yelled in his ear that being a coward would only get you killed? And you would deserve it. Turning his head, Erich saw that Beltz was shooting his rifle up the hill. Little details stood out, like how the bolt on the CZ rifle flew back into the dustcover. That was part of the reason why the Bohemian rifle was considered superior in Tropical Climates over the Mauser. Erich knew that Beltz was doing the same thing that he had done when he had been faced with the Greek Army, being seen shooting in the general direction of the enemy when you were too terrified to do anything else. The other thing that his Drill Instruction had yelled in Erich’s ear, even if you only have seconds left to live, it was still on you to make your life worth something.

For lack of any other move, Erich started crawling forward. He remembered hearing that the Japanese had employed machine guns in pairs. When on the defensive they would fire in bursts and with staggered timing. While one team shot the other would reload so that it would seem to an attacking force that there was a continuous stream of fire. This was clearly not that. There were bursts of fire, but as the Nambu only had a thirty round magazine there were pauses.

Keeping whatever cover he could find between himself and the machinegun nest, Erich could see that it was one of the dugout bunkers in the style of the ones that the Japanese had constructed by the tens of thousands throughout the Western Pacific. When the next pause came, Erich was on his feet running up the hill, half expecting to take a burst of machine gun fire for his troubles at any second. Instead he ran into the face of the bunker and the gun was unable to turn far enough to reach him as it started firing again.

The grenade that Erich threw into the bunker a few seconds later silenced the gun for good.

Minutes later, the Platoon found one of a pair of British 17-Pounders that had been repurposed for coastal defense. The crews had abandoned them after serving the purpose of slowing the Flotilla and the Marine Infantry down. The ship in the bay, which had been the entire reason for this mission in the first place was discovered to have already been pretty thoroughly picked over. In the after-action report that was submitted to the High Command, Erich’s actions had been described as brave but pointless.