Opening Moves (The Red Gambit Series) (93 page)

“The Army Commander is aware of the situation Comrade General. His Supplies section is working on how to get us moving again as we speak.”

It was Sakhno’s turn to look at his companion with surprise.

Indicating a truck drawn up on the edge of the devastated zone, the NKVD officer spat smoky oily phlegm and rummaged for his cigarettes to freshen his mouth.

“Our valiant Comrade Colonel Rassov from Army Command with a radio truck, reporting back as we speak Mikhail Gordeevich.”

Both men spat on cue for the same reason, a disgust and fear of Rassov both shared.

Polkovnik Rassov was an asshole but, unfortunately a powerful one who had the Army Commander’s ear. Throughout the Red Army he was known as the weasel.

Both men lit up and inhaled, coinciding with the first drops of rain dropping on the General’s balding pate.

“Well that’s just fucking great. Now it simply can’t get any worse,” chuckling in the way that people who have had a sense of humour failure chuckle in the face of great adversity.

“There is more Comrade.”

Reluctantly Davydov drew his commander’s attention to a previously anonymous set of wrecks lined up on a woodland path, deliberately parked close together and hidden from aerial view, until such time as the fireballs consumed vehicles, occupants, and protective forest canopy.

“According to Rassov, that is apparently the illustrious 2nd Battalion of the 8th Pontoon Brigade, sent here last night to fuel up before moving forward behind the attack we have just failed to make because of our lack of fuel.”

Sakhno screwed his face up, concentrating on the numerous wrecks that were now apparent to his gaze, making out the remains of vital bridging equipment as he moved his eyes up and down the charred lines.

“Well that’s just fucking great.”

Davydov could do no more than nod at that. Going through the options in his mind, the General was unaware of the approaching figure until his companion stiffened at his side.

Casting a swift look, he saw the diminutive figure of Rassov marching with purpose in their direction.

The two comrades exchanged a knowing look.

As the NKVD officer stood, he leaned naturally, allowing him to whisper in his general’s ear.

“I’d love to shoot the little bastard but I think it would only make matters worse my friend.”

Sakhno, remaining seated, spoke his thought rather more openly.

“Well if it looks like going bad for us, the fucking weasel will be the first to bite a bullet.”

Davydov gestured to the approaching Rassov and spoke with a lightness he did not feel.

“Comrade Colonel Rassov. Please join us.”

1748 hrs Friday 10th August 1945, Ainauwald, Germany.

Rassov had insisted on accompanying Sakhno back to his mobile headquarters at Starzhausen, just over a mile north of Wolnzach.

The five-vehicle convoy was led by a BA64 armoured car as advance screen, with the security section in an American Studebaker truck leading the main group of the 10th Tank Corps Commander’s GAZ staff car, Rassov’s Jeep and finally with the Signal vehicle from which Rassov had sent his damning reports bringing up the rear.

The BA64 driver, anxious to be back to his unit by mealtime, moved his vehicle forward above the agreed speed, his vehicle commander failing to notice the error as he examined in detail some interesting photos liberated from a ladies salon in Straubling.

Quite often in life, where there exists one error, another arrives to make matters worse.

The driver of the security section vehicle, having lost sight of the armoured car made an assumption and, instead of carrying on down the same road, turned his lorry left just past Ainau, heading down a woodland track to nowhere.

The three senior officers deep in conversation in the GAZ behind noticed nothing, the last two vehicle’s drivers would not have recognised the error in any case.

One large lorry, a signal truck, and two staff 4x4’s make quite a lot of noise, especially when driven in the Russian style down unmade roads.

Without that warning, things might have been different.

However, the racket the four vehicles made ensured that the matter was never in doubt, as the Ainauwald contained nothing but a swift death for anything with a Red Star.

Davydov had just finished remonstrating against Rassov’s accusation about the possible effects on his health of the obvious deviation from standard procedures regarding positioning of battle fuel stocks. Angry, he turned away and slowly became aware of his surroundings. He started to question the driver, an extremely average looking leviathan called Anasimova, picked for her driving ability and nothing else.

The security lorry disappeared in a wall of flame as it drove straight over a teller mine chain, three devices exploding virtually in unison.

The radio truck and crew lasted less than three seconds more as two panzerfausts arrowed in, one from each side, obliterating the cab.

The rattle of small arms fire suddenly exceeded the screams from the dying and the air was filled with deadly metal insects, each capable of taking a life.

Three, fired from an ST44 assault rifle, took Olga Anasimova in the chest, stopping her heart in an instant.

The vehicle continued forward, losing momentum and coming to a halt by bumping into the rear of the burning Studebaker.

The front seat passenger, Colonel Rassov, was hit by the same burst that killed Anasimova. Eyes wide open in shock and horror, he was conscious but unable to move, his spine severed by one strike, his arms broken and chest penetrated by the five others. Rassov’s death was noisy, protracted and excruciating as the flames advanced.

Davydov and Sakhno had bailed out, each already hit and bleeding, firing with their pistols at imagined shapes in the undergrowth.

Nodding at a thicker clump of bushes to their rear, the two gathered themselves for a superhuman effort.

They burst from behind their cover and made for relative safety behind them, from where emerged a middle-aged man wearing an SS camouflage smock.

“Sieg Heil!”

Instead of attacking that morning and exploiting the break in the line caused by the collapse of the French division, 10th Tank Corps was paralysed by the loss of its allocated fuel supply and the loss of its two key senior commanders.

Commander of 5th Guards Tank Army, Lieutenant-General Mikhail Ivanovich Savelev stepped in, reorganising the hierarchy of the 10th, mourning the loss of two competent veteran officers, and spared no thought whatsoever for the weasel he had despised.

The hiding place of Kommando Lenz had been well and truly blown and the armed group, led by the former SS Hauptsturmfuhrer of Fallschirmjager, had long disappeared.

1959 hrs Friday 10th August 1945, The Kremlin, Moscow, USSR.

Leaning back into his comfortable chair and drawing deeply on a simple pipe, the General-Secretary read the military intelligence estimate compiled following the Spanish radio message that same day, something that they had been forewarned of by agents in Spain.

Beria sat similarly comfortably polishing his glasses, enjoying the fact that Pekunin was in the limelight. Of course, he had himself been quizzed but the NKVD had already done some of the basic footwork, so his report had been examined and accepted some time before the GRU one arrived. It was delivered by a strikingly attractive GRU female Colonel, in itself a novelty.

Beria made a mental note to check out this Nazarbayeva more thoroughly, as she must have achieved her status by clever use of her obvious charms, and to his mind that meant leverage and compliance to any proposition he might put to her in future.

As she stood there, he studied how she favoured her left leg whilst stood at attention and amused himself with reaching into the recesses of his mind for the details he must have read on her at one time or another.

The shiny star on the upper left chest helped prod him in the right direction and he recalled her report on the French symposiums and then brought forward details of her service.

‘You have a husband too,’
he reflected, smiling inside but not out,

‘
All the better for what I have in mind Tatiana
.’

Catching her eye accidentally, he was immediately aware of a strength and resilience in her gaze, and part of him spoke a warning, whereas another part relished the challenge.

His warped thought process was interrupted.

“So Comrade Colonel, you conclude that this new development will interfere with our schedule?”

Nazarbayeva, inwardly feeling slightly overwhelmed at her present company but outwardly cool and composed briefly replied.

“Most certainly Comrade General-Secretary, I can see no other conclusion.”

Both Stalin and Beria knew that the NKVD report agreed with that but anticipated only a modest effect throughout the run of Kingdom39.

Stalin, referring to the document, challenged the GRU officer.

“I see here that this report originated from you, authored from start to finish by you, delivered to my hands by you. Why is that Comrade?”

“Comrade General Pekunin was wounded in an air attack on our Headquarters, not seriously, but enough to place him in hospital for the moment, Comrade General-Secretary. Comrade Lieutenant General Kochetkov is in temporary command and it was on his order that I compiled the report and presented it to you.”

Neither man said a word but both thought that Kochetkov was keeping his neck off the block and setting up his Colonel for the fall if things went wrong.

In actual fact, he had directed Nazarbayeva to do the work because of her ability, something that never occurred to either of them.

“The NKVD disagrees with you, Comrade Colonel.”

“Perhaps they have seen information that I have not Comrade-General Secretary? Maybe the GRU has information that the NKVD does not. My report is based on all information available to the GRU, Comrade General-Secretary. ”

She stood her ground, something not lost on either man.

“Very well, you may explain yourself Colonel.”

Drawing heavily on his pipe, he relaxed his frame back into the chair.

“Comrades, the Spanish Army presently consists of no more than twenty-five understrength divisions under arms, with the possibility of mobilising a maximum of two hundred-thousand more men, making their existing divisions properly constituted within a minimum of forty-eight days of any decision.”

Beria was mentally ticking off the points contained within his report, and thus far, Nazarbayeva was mirroring the NKVD submission. He had not seen the GRU document but expected no surprises.

“The Blue Division, whose membership is experienced as we know, is being mobilised as we speak and it is anticipated that it will start to move forward within fourteen days. It is also possible that sufficient personnel may be found amongst veterans of the unit to form an additional smaller formation, possibly of brigade size.”

Tatiana was relating all from memory and had just scored one point over Beria’s report.

“This force will be deployed under American command, and we understand is most likely to enter Germany north of the Swiss border, into an area of some interest to our Generals.”

Another tick.

“This force is unlikely to pose a huge problem for our armies but will have significant propaganda value to the Allies.”