*****

  It had been dark for over an hour. The temperature had already dropped ten degrees, approaching single digits. The Australian 3rd Battalion was crossing the rail bridge over the Taeryong on foot while a team of engineers planked it for the tanks and heavy trucks to use.

  The American 1st Battalion had dismounted from its vehicles and crossed the Chongchon on foot over the damaged road bridge. The Bailey Bridge trucks, finally freed from their boggy trap, had arrived. The engineer team they carried grudgingly launched into repairing the road bridge.

  “I don’t know why the hell we’re doing this now,” a disgruntled engineer sergeant said. “Looks like all the vehicles are gonna get across that railroad bridge just fine.”

  “Save that bellyaching for somebody who gives a shit,” Patchett told him. “We need this fucking bridge, and we need it yesterday. If we don’t get it, the regiment’s vehicles are gonna be backed up crossing this river all damn night and into tomorrow. Bad enough the heavy shit can only cross one at a time…and in the dark, they gotta do it even slower, because you ain’t getting no free mistakes.”

  “They ain’t the only thing that’s gotta go slow in the dark, Sarge,” the engineer whined. “We ain’t gonna be able to see shit. And it’s fucking cold. Guys’ll get hurt.”

  Patchett shot him a look that would bore holes in steel. As hardships went, he considered this small potatoes:

  Hell, nobody’s even shooting at you, for cryin’ out loud.

  But before he could express his disdain, there was a groaning sound: the agony of metal being torn apart. It was coming from the rail bridge, where Meriden’s tanks were still crossing.

  Then something made an enormous splash as it hit the water.

  In less than a minute, Jock was on the radio, asking Patchett, “What’s the status of the road bridge?”

  “Just starting work on it. Be a coupla hours until it’s ready.” He paused, almost afraid to ask what had happened. But finally, he did.

  Jock replied, “A Pershing lost control on the bridge…went over the side…damaged the bridge pretty badly.”

  Patchett didn’t need to ask about the tank crew. He knew they’d drowned:

  Tanks don’t float…not even for a damn second.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  His recon done, Captain Davis was back at the Chongchon directing the repair efforts on the two bridges. He had bad news for Jock: “The rail bridge is damaged too severely, sir. Even if we throw a Bailey across it, I’m not sure the underlying structure’s going to hold.”

  “When will you know for sure?” Jock asked.

  “Not until daylight, at least, sir. We can’t see what we’re dealing with very well right now.”

  “How much longer will the Bailey repair of the road bridge take, Captain? We’re already an hour past your original estimate.”

  “It’s slow going in the cold, sir. The men have to work with thick gloves or their hands will freeze to the metal. And everything is so slippery. If we didn’t tether the men working over the gaps…and they fell…”

  “Yeah, I know,” Jock said. “We already have five drowned tankers tonight. Let’s not add to that.”

  Davis continued, “And I can’t tell you how many pry bars and sledgehammers have fallen into the river already. If it’s not strapped to you, you’ll lose it eventually. This working in the cold is—”

  “It’s not likely to get any warmer, Captain. We have to deal with it.”

  Jock’s RTO called to him: “Cognitive Blue is on the horn, sir.”

  Cognitive Blue: 24th Division Headquarters.

  But it wasn’t some random staff officer at Division; it was General Bishop himself. He had one question for Jock: “When will your men be in Chongju?”

  “As it stands right now, General, only the Aussie battalion is across with enough vehicles to transport its men.” He went on to rehash the problems with the bridges—problems he’d already described to Bishop just two hours before—concluding with, “As a result, the Aussies only have four Shermans and three one-oh-five howitzers with them.”

  “That’s more than enough fire support for a city that’s not being defended, Miles. Let me be perfectly clear: I’m ordering you to move the Aussie battalion into Chongju without further delay. I expect to hear that they’re within the city not later than 2200 hours.”

  Jock had foreseen this order coming. In principle, at least, he’d agreed with it: If the intel is right—granted, that’s a big “if”—there’s no reason the Aussies shouldn’t push ahead, and I told them to do just that. The rest of the regiment should be able to catch up with them before daybreak.

  Colonel Hitchcock didn’t even need to be ordered to do it.

  He volunteered.

  But I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t uneasy about the whole thing. Four tanks and three howitzers aren’t exactly an overwhelming amount of fire support.

  He told the general, “The Aussies are already halfway there, sir.”

  He heard the general key the microphone, but he said nothing for a few moments. Jock thought that might be the electronic equivalent of stunned silence.

  Then Bishop said, “Outstanding. I’ll advise Eighth Army immediately.”

  Such an announcement seemed a little premature to Jock. He considered saying, Maybe we ought to hedge our bets and not tell the world until we’re sure this is going to work?

  As far as the general was concerned, though, the conversation was over. His last transmission: “Carry on. Cognitive Blue, out.”

  *****

  If they didn’t light warming fires, the GIs on both sides of the Chongchon would be crippled by the cold…or could even freeze to death. But fires were beacons for enemy gunners. Patchett proposed a plan to confuse those gunners.

  “We light one big decoy fire—a bonfire—on the south bank of the Chongchon, sir,” he said to Jock, “in an upwind spot where we got nothing going on. It’ll generate a haze that hangs low in this cold air and hides whatever’s behind it, like a cheap smokescreen that sticks around longer. See how all that vehicle exhaust just hangs low in the air? The smoke from the fire’ll do the same thing. Once that bonfire’s roaring, we light smaller fires for the men to warm themselves by…behind the decoy…so a gook FO won’t be able to see those little ones real good. And even if he could see ’em, all that haze’ll play hell with his range estimates.”

  “It’s worth a shot,” Jock said.

  “And I’ll tell those First Battalion boys waiting for their deuces at the Taeryong to do the same.”

  “Yeah, let’s do that, Top.”

  The regiment still hadn’t gotten their full allotment of winter clothing; far from it. But they had just received several thousand GI blankets. Patchett explained to Jock how the men were putting them to use:

  “They don’t need ’em for bedrolls, since they all got sleeping bags. Some boys just cut a hole in the middle of the blanket and wear it like a poncho. But when they get a minute, they can turn it into something even better, like this…”

  He opened his field jacket to reveal a woolen vest cut from a blanket. Then he patted his legs and said, “You can make pants liners out of ’em, too. One blanket, some string, and a nail to punch holes is all a man needs to do it. And if he’s real careful, he’ll have enough left over to sew a helmet liner and mittens.”

  Reaching into his jeep, he pulled out a vest and a pants liner that resembled knickers. “Here you go, sir. Made you a set, too.”

  Genuinely grateful, Jock replied, “Thanks a lot, Top.”

  “And if somebody wants to say we’re willfully destroying government property, that somebody can kiss my toasty ass, sir.”

  *****

  The Australians hadn’t gotten their new issue of blankets; they were already across the Taeryong when the supply trucks had shown up at the regiment. But the diggers most exposed to the bitter cold night—those riding the beds of the deuces—were the warmest men in the battalion. They were cocooned in their sleeping bags with their rifles.

  Colonel Hitchcock checked his wristwatch: it read 2105 hours.

  Bloody shame we can’t go any faster, he told himself, but the Shermans set the pace. Even at this speed, though, we’ll still be at Chongju in another forty minutes. At least we’ve got a full moon, so driving with only blackout lights isn’t much of a problem. I’m almost tempted to use regular headlights, but let’s be prudent, Neville. We’re already making enough noise to wake the dead. No point lighting us up like a bloody carnival, too, because that “open city” talk could still be bullshit.

  *****

  The Aussies were two miles from Chongju, near the tiny village of Pangchon-dong, when an explosion rocked the middle of the column. It took a few seconds for the shock and disorientation to wear off; only then did Colonel Hitchcock realize what had happened:

  That deuce lying on its side…it hit a bloody mine.

  But how? Six vehicles drove over that same spot before it even got there…and two of them were Shermans.

  His column kept rumbling forward as if by habit, just one truck slowing to scoop up the occupants of the stricken deuce. Then the green tracers began flying at the vehicles like angry insects, drawing dashed lines back to the guns firing them.

  “STOP AND ENGAGE,” Hitchcock commanded over the radio. That would be standard procedure for a unit caught in a classically laid ambush, where the ambushers had set a roadblock which prevented forward progress—and escape—from the kill zone. Vehicles had no choice but to stop; the men on board would then dismount and counterattack. If the ambush had been expertly laid, there was a good chance they’d die anyway. If they didn’t attempt the counterattack, though, they would surely die.

  But nobody was paying attention to the colonel. Instead, they were following Lieutenant Meriden’s guidance, which was, “KEEP MOVING. THERE’S NOTHING AHEAD OF US. DRIVE OUT OF IT.”

  Following that advice was easy. In the tug of war raging in each man’s mind over fight or flight, flight won out handily. It seemed in the best interests of self-preservation.

  That the column kept moving was a good thing. By the time the diggers would’ve managed to free themselves from their sleeping bags—under fire—in a stopped vehicle, most would’ve been dead.

  Those vicious green tracers kept lashing out at them, but they were the least of Meriden’s worries; powerful anti-tank guns and T-34s were. To protect the trucks, he and Colonel Hitchcock had established the order of march with two of his four Shermans positioned together at the head of the column and the other two together in the trailing quarter.

  Tanks should never work alone, right?

  “TURN INTO THEM,” Meriden commanded the two trailing Shermans, “AND LET THEM HAVE IT.”

  As the tanks pivoted to engage, the KPA gunners made a crucial mistake: they turned all their automatic weapons fire onto the armored vehicles. It hurt them not at all, and it gave the trucks precious seconds to escape.

  Bullets bouncing off their bows, the two Shermans let loose with bursts from their own .30-caliber machine guns. Then they added several rounds from their 76-millimeter main guns.

  There was one more explosion on the roadway: a fleeing deuce had struck another mine.

  And then the fight was over. It had lasted less than a minute.

  *****

  The jeep’s odometer told Hitchcock they’d traveled the requisite distance to be one mile from Chongju. He brought his column to a halt to assess and regroup.

  “Only a few dead and wounded,” the colonel said with bittersweet relief. Seeing their blood-soaked sleeping bags, he realized how disastrous it would’ve been to stop the column.

  He told Meriden, “Thank you, Lieutenant. I was ready to have you bloody court-martialed at first…but you were right to keep us moving. You saved the battalion. I’ll see to it you’re decorated for this.”

  “I was just saving my own ass, sir. No medal is necessary.”

  But something else was on Hitchcock’s mind. “I don’t understand how so much of the column—and those bloody heavy Shermans—passed over the same spots and didn’t set off the mines.”

  “It happens like that sometimes, sir,” Meriden explained. “The tanks may be heavier, but their tracks give them a much wider footprint. It spreads the pressure out a lot more than the contact point of a truck’s tire, so a pressure-activated mine won’t always blow for a tank. As icy as this road is, I’m kind of surprised they blew at all. They must’ve just been planted…and I guess they didn’t have time to plant too many, either.”

  “So the other trucks were just lucky enough to miss those mines?” Hitchcock asked.

  “Looks that way, sir.”

  The colonel took a quick look at the terrain on which they’d stopped. “I think we’ll set up our perimeter here for the night. This is flat and firm ground—a perfect place to emplace the howitzers.”

  “So we’re not going into Chongju tonight, sir?”

  “Absolutely not. Open city, my arse.”

  Meriden breathed a sigh of relief. Then he said, “A couple of suggestions, sir?”

  “Of course. Let’s hear them.”

  “Have the artillery emplaced so the guns can fire in any direction. No telling where the gooks might come from.”

  “Excellent idea. What else?”

  “Have the mortars ready to fire illum rounds. Don’t waste the little artillery we’ve got shooting flares.”

  “Again, an excellent idea. What about your tanks?”

  “They’ll form two teams, with both tanks in the team roving together just outside the perimeter. Keep them moving so they don’t freeze up.”

  “Why outside the perimeter?”

  “So we don’t run over our own guys in the dark, sir.”

  “Hmm…I was thinking more of positioning each vehicle in its own defensive quadrant, Lieutenant.”

  “Negative, sir. Tanks are at their best when they’re moving. And another thing…they should never work alone. They’re too vulnerable to sappers that way.”

  Hitchcock thought it over for a moment. Then he asked, “Is that what your Sergeant Moon believes, too?”

  “He’s one of the guys who wrote the book, sir.”

  *****

  Colonel Hitchcock’s jeep had the only radio with the power to reach Jock’s CP, still at the Chongchon bridges twenty miles to the east. He almost wished he wouldn’t be able to raise it. Then, no one could order him to attempt to occupy Chongju in the dark.

  But I bloody well have to dispel this “open city” nonsense.

  The CP replied on his first call, telling him to “Wait one.”

  When Regiment transmitted again, he recognized the voice: Jock Miles.

  Hitchcock was thrilled to hear him say, “Do not—repeat, do not—enter Chongju before daybreak.”

  He was less thrilled to hear that the rest of the regiment wouldn’t catch up to the Australians tonight. The fact that his battalion had run into KPA—and a minefield—along the route was a game changer. The regimental column would include a supply train carrying great quantities of ammunition and fuel. To send such a convoy into contested territory at night—without the vigilance and firepower of aircraft overhead—was inviting disaster. The Aussie battalion would be on its own for at least the next twelve hours.

  *****

  Hitchcock forbid his men to make fires, even stamping out one with his own boots. “But why, sir?” one of his diggers protested. “It’s no bloody secret we’re here. And we’re going to freeze without some bloody heat.”

  A sergeant proposed a compromise: “Let’s keep the watches short…say, one hour. Everybody not on watch can be in his sleeping bag. Since we’re keeping all the motors running, put the bags of the blokes on watch under vehicles’ bonnets. That way, you won’t have to waste body heat warming them up.”

  “I reckon I’ll sleep under a bloody bonnet myself,” a private said.

  Another offered, “Or how about on the decks of the bloody tanks? It’s nice and cozy up there.”

  “Afraid not,” Lieutenant Meriden replied. “You’re going to be really sorry you’re up there when the shooting starts. And there’s no room for you inside, where, by the way, it isn’t much warmer than it is standing out here.”

  After a little more dickering, the sleeping bag proposal became the approved solution. But there was one final question: “Can’t we even heat up our C rations, sir? They’ll be like sucking on ice cubes.”

  Hitchcock replied, “Sure, you can heat them up…after sunrise.”

  *****

  Lieutenant Meriden saw them first.

  Two T-34s were moving along the railroad tracks south of the Aussie perimeter, their dark silhouettes intermittently blending into an irregular tree line behind them. For the moment, they were broadside to the main guns of his two patrolling Shermans. He was willing to bet they hadn’t seen the American tanks yet.

  “What do you make the range?” he asked his gunner.

  “A thousand yards, sir. Maybe a little more.”

  Too far. The odds of a first-round hit go way down, especially in the dark.

  “Get closer.”

  “How much closer, sir?”

  “I’ll let you know. Keep moving.”

  I want a flank shot. I’ve got one…but if they turn toward us, I lose it.

  “What’s the range now?”

  “About fifty yards less than the last time you asked, Lieutenant.”

  Meriden hadn’t buttoned up the turret. He needed to see his adversaries as well as possible in the dark. The T-34s still seemed oblivious to the American tanks.

  “I can take them from right here, Lieutenant,” the gunner said.

  “No. We need to be closer.”

  The TC of his partner tank, a sergeant named Adair, was on the radio now, asking, “Should we light them up with some illum rounds?”

 

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