| From: | "Paul J. Adam" <shadowtk@********.DEMON.CO.UK> |
|---|---|
| Subject: | Armoured Warfare |
| Date: | Sun, 16 Nov 1997 12:49:38 +0000 |
>>>>>[Hi there. I got your messages so I thought I'd show you how my
part of the operation went, which was as you probably know really well.
+++++begin video
Stephanie checks her watch. "H-hour minus thirty seconds. Send to Wolf
Den that we're in position and holding." The loader taps the message
into his terminal and hits XMIT, sending the coded burst.
"Fifteen seconds. Crank it." In the front of the tank, the huge diesel
snarls and roars like a hungry dinosaur.
"Ten seconds. Driver, advance hull-down." The tank lurches forward,
picking its way forward: Stephanie undogs her hatch and stands on her
seat.
Ahead of her, over the slight ridge (four tanks and eight eight-wheeled
LAVs with long-barreled gun turrets are tucked in behind it, barely
their turrets showing) her helmet camera sees the plain, the mine camp
tucked into the hills at one end, the road snaking past, and the
clusters of vehicles and tents laid out across it. Akbar's force is
spread out around Camp Two, contemptuous of cover or concealment where
it sits out of effective range of its defenders.
Twelve T-95 tanks are advancing in a skirmish line, three times their
number of BMP-4s following closely: all pouring a heavy fire into the
camp's walls. Behind them, a compact mass of infantry on foot and
armoured vehicles awaits, ready to smash against any weak point created
in the defence.
There is almost no return fire from the camp, as the Yemeni tanks
approach.
Stephanie is counting almost her breath "...three, two, one..."
A roar like low-flying aircraft splits the sky, as the assault group -
hundreds of men, dozens of vehicles - disappears in a boiling cloud of
flame-shot smoke and dust. Smoke trails lash out and nine of the
bulldozer-equipped tanks explode almost in unison, the other three dying
seconds later.
"SPLASH! Arty hitting!" Stephanie shouts gleefully. "Gunner, engage my
target!" The thunder of the explosions washes over her as she drops down
into her seat.
"Engaging! On the way!" The gunner replies, the turret slewing slightly
and the gun elevating a little. There is a shattering clang, the breech
flies back two feet and spits out a stub of brass case which falls
smoking to the floor.
"Reload FIN! Target! Engage tank!" The loader kicks a footbar and a door
in the ammo racks flies open, and the Ork snatches out a needle-nosed
APFSDS round and slams it into the breech.
"Loaded! Up!"
"Engaging! On the way!" Again the clang and the spit of a case stub.
Less than five seconds between shots.
"Reload FIN! Target! Engage tank! All Tigers, go for the tanks!"
Stephanie shouts.
"Loaded! Up!" the loader shouts.
"On the way!" the gunner replies: the tank rocks on its suspension and
the spent stub clatters across the floor.
Stephanie presses her face to her sight, swinging it slightly (the
camera seeing only the white-painted side of her cupola). "Target!
Driver, advance! Tigers, advance in line abreast! Gunner, fire at will!"
The seventy-ton tank accelerates forward, the turret gyros hissing and
sighing as they keep the main gun stable on target. "Jaguars, kill the
troop carriers!"
"Load HESH!" the gunner shouts, waits for acknowledgement, fires.
"Reload HESH!"
"Gunner, air defence vehicle!" Stephanie calls.
"Seen! On the way!" The gun traverses and fires yet again. The fighting
compartment is beginning to fill with the reeking haze of double-base
propellant fumes, despite the extractor on the gun and the best efforts
of the ventilation system.
Something clangs off the turret front, as deafeningly loud as the main
gun firing. "FUCK OFF! Gunner, engage designated!" the young commander
shouts angrily, jerking her cupola around to indicate the tank she wants
killed.
"Load FIN!" the gunner replies. A few seconds later the main gun fires:
Stephanie is shouting orders to the rest of the platoon, something about
crunchies running, and you hear the clatter of the machinegun from her
cupola.
"Load canister!" the gunner calls.
"Can loaded! Up!"
"On the way!" The floor is half-hidden by the brass stub casings of the
main gun, and yet another joins them.
"Good one!" Stephanie exults, still firing the MAG-5 on her cupola. The
tank's coaxial machine gun opens up too, as does the 30mm cannon mounted
above the main gun. "Driver, lay smoke! Crash stop!" Everyone is thrown
around as the Merkava comes to an abrupt halt. "Gunner, kill those
tanks!"
"Load FIN!" the gunner replies, face pressed to his eyepiece and laying
the gun precisely. "On the way! Target! Load FIN!"
Again, something makes the tank shudder on its suspension with a ringing
impact, and it lurches forward a few feet.
"No damage!" the driver calls.
"On the way!" and the sharp boom-clang of the main gun firing.
"Target!"
Stephanie swings her cupola through almost ninety degrees. "Jaguars, fan
out wider and stay behind our smoke. Concentrate on the troop carriers
and the infantry. We've got the tanks covered." The gun fires again.
"Target!" calls the gunner. "All armour burning. Orders?"
"Tiger Platoon, regroup on me and advance echelon left. Make smoke and
screen the Jaguars. We'll sweep into their rear." Stephanie marks the
lines of advance on her terminal screen and hits XMIT. "Are the
bumblebees hitting them yet? I don't see their input."
"Rog." the loader says after a glance at his own terminal. "They hit the
assault group and now they're herding."
Stephanie stands again, as the tank bounces and jolts across the plain:
she's thrown back slightly as the main gun fires again, forty feet of
fiery muzzle blast and the small orange glow of the tracer in the
shell's base visible: it hits a BMP-4 and the HESH round almost blows it
apart. The Yemeni Jihad's vehicles are fleeing, outdistancing the slower
Merkavas but taking terrible losses as the tanks pick off target after
target: rockets and missiles from flank positions, where isn't visible
in the darkness, are also wreaking havoc, and the artillery is still
landing bomblet rounds amidst Akbar's vehicles, killing and crippling
with every salvo.
To her flank, an infantry battle seems to be in progress, Akbar's troops
having the advantage of numbers but Sasha's force still has its
vehicles: the LAV-30 APCs laying down a storm of cannon and machinegun
fire, and mortar rounds landing at a terrifying rate. Dozens of trucks
and tents are burning amidst the dust and smoke.
The Yemeni vehicles are disappearing into the highway cutting, and
Stephanie drops back into her seat again. "Dave, get us some cover, no
closer than fifteen hundred metres."
"You got it." The Merkava swerves slightly towards a fold in the ground
that offers a little protection.
+++++end video
That was _fun_.]<<<<<
-- Stephanie <12:49:41/11-16-58>
