Dark Earth: Return to Charlotteville

Return to Charlotteville Part 5

The late afternoon sun bore down upon Captain Dornan with a relatively pleasant warmth, the humidity being blessedly less in the Congolese dry season. They’d chosen ‘A’ Company’s new home well and Camp Firefly was not without its comforts, but it’s primary role was still eminently plain. Fifteen miles north of the Luvua River, the forests cleared into a rough scar slashing from west to east as the land rose slightly. The location for the base had been planned and selected when they were still back in Blighty, the land cleared with a succession of blast bombs deployed by Valiants and shaped by heliborne combat wizards of the Royal Engineers.

Now there was a base better than they had defended last time around. The buildings were mainly Romney huts for the time being, but there was a landing ground for helicopters, a depot for their vehicles and, most importantly, gun positions for their mortars, artillery, tanks and rocket launchers. Beyond them was the infantry trenchline around the edge of the high ground, although the fieldworks had more of the nature of sangars to them due to their position, then the wire and open ground for a mile in every direction.

All up, in addition to the usual company weapons, Dornan could count on the support of four 125mm Light Guns, two 4.5” and four 3.5” mortars, two Valiant and four Royalist tanks, eight carriers including the RMGC boys and a single Catapult multiple rocket launcher. It was understandable given their position as the forward company, not to mention their rather special guest officers, but he supposed that with great firepower came great responsibility. If anything major came up, then he could simply call upon the big 6” guns and the rest of the 125s back at Goi-Ganga, which were positioned so they could cover any of the companies in the field, whilst the brigade reserves back in Charlotteville were less than 20 minutes flying time away. They had sixteen company firebases in their sector of Katanga, just one part in the web of firepower and control that stretched out across this part of darkest Africa.

If anything, they had learnt the lessons of the past too well. Where there had been separation from heavy weapons and guns in the past, they were now embedded at the lowest possible tactical level. This certainly provided for more lethality and firepower on the battlefield, as he had no doubt that he could take his company out on the attack against a foe ten or more times their strength with every assurance of success. This did promote a certain type of fighting solution to many potential problems as, when one has a warhammer on one’s belt, suddenly everything seemed like a nail.

‘Overkill’ was the word that the Panorama chap had used. As far as he was concerned, that spoke more to the fellow’s lack of experience in real combat than anything else. For Captain James Dornan, there was no such thing as being too strong or having too much firepower. So far, the only enemy forces they had encountered, the putative rebels, were the same type of disorganised light irregulars as the Simbas had been and had no answer to artillery, tanks and the air cover that extended over the entire province. This was the most substantive difference for the men on the ground, whether out on patrol or within their fortified camps - the RAF or the RFC were only ever a dozen or two minutes away. There were Harriers at Charlotteville alongside the new Tiger gunships and the Fairey Rotodyne Avengers, but chief pride of place there went to the great black Armstrong-Whitworth Warspite gunship. Further back at the big airfields were the squadrons of fast jets - British and South African Phantoms, Rhodesian Canberras and Spectres, Canadian Tornadoes and Kenyan Hunters. Overkill? Vae victis.

All of that tactical airpower required effective ground control and direction and ‘A’ Company had its detachment of RAF tactical air controllers at Firefly as did every other post. He had made immediate efforts to embed them within the company’s structure and this has paid off in the contacts they had fought so far. They were fairly gregarious chaps for Crabs, but did seem to view anyone who fought on the ground as faintly anachronistic eccentrics. The Royal Artillery lads were men after his own heart, in contrast - rough, ready and just as happy firing in direct support as at targets many miles away spotted by their funny little flying saucers. The Light Guns were the icing on the cake for him, giving the ability to reach out and touch somebody up to 20 miles away with ten 50lb shells a minute per gun. That was the main weapon of Firefly in truth.

They would be as vital and valuable here in Africa as they were in South Vietnam. There, artillery had proved its mettle in the jungle eminently clearly, with the new generation of British Commonwealth guns being central to victory in several hard fought battles. The one that Dornan kept coming back to was the Battle of Long Tan. Three years ago, an Australian infantry company had been engaged by a Viet Cong regiment during a battalion strength sweep in a rubber plantation and, once the enemy’s strength became apparent, called in an Uncle Target, bringing every gun and mortar deployed by the entire Anzac Division on them. The New Zealand Brigade had still been equipped with the automatic 25 pounders back then, but the Aussies had the newer 125s, 6 inch, along with a freshly deployed 8 inch regiment at Vung Tau; even the sole tank regiment within range had joined in. The king of battle had showed why he wore his crown on that day, even before the RAAF and RAN tacair could join in. The five dozen Chieftains of the relief force turned that battle into a rout and the VC had learned the bitter lesson not to take the bait of a seemingly lone company. Would the Simbas or whatever rebels were out there try the same thing?

For tomorrow’s operation, they would be able to call upon the guns here and back at battalion should it become necessary, but Dornan hardly thought it likely. He would be taking out over half of the company out into the field on a sweep and clear operation of a ruined hamlet nine miles to the north after there had been reports of suspected insurgent forces in the vicinity. Aerial recce runs had not found any definitive sight of their presence, but orders had come down from on high. A show of force mission, so he was going to show force alright - he was taking out armoured cars, carriers and tanks and the Royal Flying Corps boys would be flying cover with four Bulldogs up top.

They would have company on the ground, too - a platoon of tough bush soldiers of the Rhodesian Light Infantry and one of Zulus. Second to none in their repute for ferocity and military prowess across all of the Dark Continent, the Zulu Regiments were one of the most feared forces in all of Her Majesty’s armies, so he had welcomed the news of their attachment when the coded news had come in yesterday. The sight of sixty of the tall seasoned warriors running into Camp Firefly clad in their characteristic mix of special camouflage uniforms, leopard skins and pith helmets and carrying their traditional assegai bayonets would be enough to give any foe pause. After all, when the Zulu charged, he charged home.

The two supporting platoons would take the flanks and act as the horns of the buffalo (he had garnered an approving nod from the English lieutenant commanding the Zulus for that one) whilst he pushed forward with his carriers covered by the tanks, Maxims and mortars. Apart from those particular sledgehammers, he did have two experimental weapons attached for field testing - the L18 and the L2A9; innocuous names for what they offered, the new automatic mortar and a belt fed Wombat respectively. If there were any surprises, he had the Catapult back here registered and ready to plaster the area with rockets and the 4.5 mortars standing by to slime the buggers with Green Cross. His orders had been quite clear - it was time to take off the white gloves.

“Right then. We depart at 0920 in two coordinated columns under Lieutenants Seaworth and Cunningham, reach the target in 76 minutes and advance in open V to cover the flanks of whatever enemy force is in place. The Rhodies take the right, the Zulus take the left and I’ll control the reserve platoon and support back here.” He smacked the map with his swagger stick, indicating the positions for the forthcoming attack with an exaggerated flourish, as requested by the dashed Panorama director. The real briefing had already taken place; this was just the television adaption, he thought with a wry internal smile.

“Both of our own forward platoons are to advance through their phase lines in alternate order using fire and movement. The Saxons are to be in immediate support and the tanks in secondary support; should the enemy display any heavy resistance, then we give them a heavy stonk with the 3.5s before the Light Guns start up a walking barrage on their target lines, shifting up 50 yards every four minutes, as needed. The helos will be waiting for red smoke; anything heavier needing fast movers will be purple. The 6 inch battery back at Goi-Ganga is ‘Cinderella’. Nothing goes to chance here, gentlemen. Questions?”

This was the moment when there weren’t supposed to be any questions, but the striking blond lieutenant at the back with the insignia of the Coldstream Guards raised his hand.

“Yes, Lieutenant Romanov?”

“What will be the procedure for pursuit, Major? If the enemy run?” He spoke in perfect received pronounciation without a hint of a foreign accent.

You stay put, so I can get you on back to your Scottish palace safe and sound was what Dornan would have liked to say, but this was the real world, even when on television.

“A good question, Your Imperial Highness. During engagement, it will be purely a section issue. Beyond the scope of Phase Line Zeta, it will require approval from myself. We don’t want subunits going off in hot pursuit and finding themselves in hot water or even worse, if things got a bit sticky. Orders are quite precise on that.”

“I see.” Strange that one could find Russian ice in Katanga.

“I would say that is standard common sense, Alex, not just nannying us in particular.” Romanov’s erstwhile cousin, styled as Lieutenant Wales for Tancred cut in affably. “Without a proper notion of what the enemy have in the field, it wouldn’t be responsible to go charging in like the Cossacks. Present company excepted.” He nodded at the two talk swarthy guards in the corner who stood like silent sentinels.

“Very good, very good. I see your point, as ever.”

Now it was Dornan’s turn to nod ever so slightly at his future King. A decent head on one’s shoulders in the field was a useful enough trait for a sovereign, but adding deft diplomacy to boot was a good and decent sign.

“Thank you. Anything further? Good. In that case, it is time we were to table.”

The delectable smells emanating from the officer’s mess through the afternoon were one positive to the ‘guests’ in his care, as the best cook in the whole division had been seconded. The fellow wasn’t even Army Catering Corps, but rather an officer and gentleman himself from 25 RTR! It would be interesting to see what the erstwhile Captain Keith Floyd had come up with this time.

…………………………………………….

Their repast had indeed been the epitome of salubrious scrumptiousity, the cook Captain having discovered the very best of their fresh rations and supplies before the morrow’s operation. As well as the soldier’s traditional roast meats and beefsteaks, Floyd had whipped up a lamb curry (always popular to those who had spent time East of Suez) somehow got hold of a brace of salmon and half a dozen lobsters; it seemed that having the heir to the Empire as a guest had its benefits. The BBC fellows chipped in from their own supplies of strange fruit and the Prince’s wizard proffered some powdered corn from his Hollywood sojourn in Venice, where apparently there weren’t the same spaghetti trees as elsewhere in Italy. In any event, it would be more than sufficient to prepare them for the morning.

The young SAS officer commanding the Royal Duties Patrol, Lieutenant Peter Bailey, would be taking his men out for a bit of final reconnaissance after dark, using their new active camouflage stealth armour, so he would at least get some better intelligence on the force awaiting them. In Malaya, they had been known as Ma Rung, the Phantoms of the Jungle; now ghosts would walk on this African night. If he’d had his druthers, then he would have attacked at night, using the advantage given by their darkvision sights, but Division wanted to be able to keep track of the enemy from their eyes in the sky. Not for the first time, he gave an inward wry grin at just how much the Army was using Tancred as a field laboratory. It was certainly a more controlled environment than South Vietnam, even though it seemed like they were winning there.