Vortex (98 page)

Commandant Kruger and his traitorous 20th Cape Rifle battalion.

And Maj. Rolf Bekker always obeyed his orders.

DECEMBER
14-
FORWARD
HEADQUARTERS
,
CUBAN
EXPEDITIONARY
FORCE
,

POTGIETERSRUS

Gen. Antonio Vega tried not to let his anger and frustration show. It was important that his staff, and all his men, think that he was in absolute control, but inside, his inner drive was locked in its own private war with his patience. Damn it, they had to get moving again!

Castro’s latest message lay on his desk, an unwelcome reminder of his progress. The tone was encouraging enough: The presence of the Western imperialists shows that the South Africans must be on their last legs, otherwise their masters would not have to rescue them. Press on to victory!

Cuba has every confidence in you.

Press on with what? Despite an apparently overwhelming victory at

Potgietersrus more than two weeks before, his offensive had ground almost to a halt. The Afrikaners were proving unexpectedly resilient. And his own problems seemed to multiply with every passing day.

His own slow progress was especially galling in the face of the Americans’ removal of South Africa’s nuclear option and their successful landing at Cape Town. He had to move fast-his window was closing.

The loss of South Africa’s nuclear capability had not overly helped him, since his tactics of dispersion and civilian masking had worked well. It simplified his movement plans, but you had to be moving for that to matter.

His First Brigade Tactical Group had begun squandering the first fruits of its triumph in the first hours after its attack. When Colonel Mahmoud’s

Libyan motorized rifle battalion entered the city, it had stumbled into what its poorly trained, poorly paid soldiers regarded as their own private treasure trove. Hundreds of homes abandoned by their white owners-homes packed with portable radios, television sets, and stereo systems. Stores and shops crammed with rich foods, automobiles, and other luxury items.

Even with assistance from Cuban troops following close behind, it had taken

Mahmoud precious hours to bring his rioting, rampaging men to heel.

Then, when Vega’s troops were finally able to resume their drive south, they’d run headlong into more Afrikaner troops hurrying north-the first significant numbers of tanks and guns to arrive from the stalemated

Namibian front. So what should have been a cakewalk had turned into a bloody, bruising, two-day fight that left both sides exhausted and about where they’d started from. Even worse, the battle had consumed the Cuban tactical group’s carefully hoarded stockpiles of ammunition and fuel.

Supply. Vega rubbed his temples, feeling the start of another pounding headache. He’d always known that logistics would be his largest problem-especially for the First Brigade Tactical Group. He had a

Soviet-supplied airhead at Pietersburg, but cargo aircraft alone couldn’t carry the massive quantities of diesel fuel, ammunition, and spare parts a modern mechanized army needed to keep moving and fighting. Most of the supplies he needed had to go by sea to Maputo, then northward along the railroad to Rutenga, and from there south into South Africa-an overland distance of more than one thousand kilometers.

The distance alone presented his supply officers with an almost insoluble problem. The constant hit-and-run attacks on his truck convoys and freight trains only made things worse. Not only were white South African commandos attacking his columns, but breakaway guerrillas from the
ANC
and other black groups were making separate raids. He smiled grimly. It was probably the first time that the two sides had ever agreed on anything.

Vega remembered the early days of the offensive, when his men had been welcomed by villages they passed with gifts of food and beer. Now they got rocks if they were lucky, bullets if they were not.

He scowled. Whether he liked it or not, the First Tactical Group’s days of easy victories and rapid advances were over. The supplies it needed to go back on the offensive were coming in steadily-but only very slowly.

And until he had enough fuel and ammunition, his northernmost attack column was reduced to simple skirmishing-company-strength probes of the

Afrikaner defenses at Naboomspruit, fifty kilometers south of

Potgietersrus.

Farther south and east, his Second Brigade Tactical Group found itself in a similar situation. Closer to the port facilities at Maputo, its supply problems were less pronounced. But the Second had to fight its way up the tangle of mountains, ridges, and chasms called the Great

Escarpment. Despite heavy losses, its daily gains were often only measured in hundreds of meters.

And the Third…

Vega’s headache intensified. The split-second destruction of his third attack column had been even more disastrous than he’d first supposed. The

Third Tactical Group had been the striking arm that was supposed to outmaneuver the Afrikaner defenses. Without the “three” in his “one-two-three” punch, he was reduced to this damned crawling advance, attacking South Africa’s strongest defenses head-on. It was a formula for losing the war.

Maneuver was the way to win a war in Africa, but he didn’t have any units to maneuver with. At the moment, his sole reserve consisted of two companies of infantry, one of tanks, and a battery of self-propelled artillery.

Stripped of his strategic mobility and tactical flexibility, he’d counted on using chemical weapons to break open the war again. Unfortunately, since that first devastating attack, their effects hadn’t matched his hopes and expectations.

There were several reasons for that. First, the battle for Potgietersrus had used up most of his hastily obtained stocks of sarin. Acquiring more had proven unexpectedly difficult and time consuming. International condemnation and pressures were making even Castro increasingly reluctant to approve its use.

These political restrictions were matched by military difficulties.

Weather was sometimes a problem. To minimize self-inflicted casualties and delays, chemicals were best used when the winds blew from the northeast-toward the enemy lines and away from his own positions. At the same time, Vega knew the Afrikaners were learning how to fight in a chemical environment. They’d doled out a limited supply of protective gear to their front line troops and artillery crews. Unprotected troops were kept dispersed and well hidden. And accurate counter battery fire by long-range G-5 and G-6 155mm guns often wreaked havoc among his own artillerymen when they tried to fire chemical shells.

The Cuban general grimaced. Supply shortages. Commando raids. And the growing fear that his grand offensive might grind to a halt far short of its objectives. All of that was bad enough, however he looked at it. Very bad. But now he had to worry about the damned Western allies-the Americans and their British lackeys.

With the forces at his disposal, he didn’t have the slightest chance of interfering with the Western troop buildup in Cape Town. He’d never planned to fight a war that far away from South Africa’s northern and eastern borders. His strategy had always been to capture the centers of government and let the distant provinces fall into his lap.

Still, he thought, the important regions were within reach. Cape Town was famous for its wine and its wool. Well, he’d

rather have Pretoria’s diamonds and gold. Let Washington and London squabble over South Africa’s dregs.

“Colonel Suarez!” His chief of staff’s office was always next door, well within earshot. Suarez appeared immediately.

“Send a message to Havana, ” Vega ordered. ”

“The Western presence means we must accept a limited, but still significant, victory-liberation of the

Transvaal and the Orange Free State. I am sure that you will see the necessity of this decision.”

”

Vega paused briefly, wondering if there was anything else he should add.

Nothing came immediately to mind.

“Send it. And call a staff meeting in five minutes. We have to get this offensive moving again.”

DECEMBER
15-
USS
MOUNT
VsIHITNEY,
SIMONS
TOWN
NAVAL
BASE
,
CAPE
TOWN

One thousand miles west of Durban, several anxious-looking staff officers crowded one of the Mount Whitney’s conference rooms. The U.S. and Great

Britain had a secure foothold in the Cape Province, but Cape Town had never been viewed as anything more than a stepping stone toward South Africa’s industrial and political heartland-Pretoria and Johannesburg. Going overland would take too long. Going by sea meant making another landing somewhere farther up the Natal coast-an opposed landing, where they would have to fight their way ashore. The sea route, in spite of its risks, had always been part of the plan, but it might not be fast enough.

“I just don’t see how we can be ready in time, General. The buildup’s just too far behind schedule. ” Brig. Gen. George Skiles, Craig’s chief of staff, was adamant, but also distressed. He was a hard worker, with a “can do” attitude, and it hurt Skiles’s professional pride to admit failure.

Lt. Gen. Jerry Craig sat glowering, a man unhappy with the news he’d received but unable to shoot the messenger. Shipping delays, bad weather in the Atlantic, and tired air crews had already put his buildup nearly three days behind its original schedule. That wasn’t bad when you considered how many tens of thousands of troops and pieces of heavy equipment were en route-streaming across thousands of miles of empty ocean and airspace.

But it wasn’t good enough. Neither the Cubans nor Vorster’s men showed any signs of adhering to the timetable established in Washington.

Photo recon missions over the Potgietersrus area showed massive and unmistakable signs of a Cuban supply buildup. This Vega character was planning to jump-start his own stalled offensive first. At the same time,

Afrikaner commanders up and down the Natal coast were doing what they could to strengthen their own defenses against an allied amphibious assault.

Craig frowned. The schedule for his own planned landing in Durban was looking more and more like a nonstarter.

The original plan called for a full division of U.S. Marines and a Royal

Marine Commando to make the landing, supported by a battalion-sized air assault on Durban’s Luis Botha airfield. Two Army divisions-the 7th Light and the 101st Air Assault-would move in once the airfield had been secured. Heavy armor units still sailing from the U.S. were scheduled to off-load directly at Durban-once its harbor was secure.

The operation was precisely timed and hard to change once the units were in motion. Craig remembered how carefully they’d all considered the date of the landing back in Washington. Tides, weather, and phases of the moon all had to be folded in along with the strategic situation. How quickly could American forces be ready? How fast could the Cubans move?

To allow some flexibility, he’d ordered alternate staff plans prepared.

One assumed landing a day early, one a day late. But by December 24, the planned D day, Vega could be drinking Cape wine in Pretoria, thumbing his nose at the Western allies from the Union Buildings.

Craig lowered his chin onto his chest, thinking hard. Like all good staffs, his people tended to be cautious and conservative-” risk averse” in
DOD
lingo. They often followed a general rule in putting together operations-figure out how much firepower you thought you’d need and double it. And usually they were right. An amphibious landing was

the riskiest kind of operation in military art. You had to assemble overwhelming firepower, with enough force to shove the bad guys off the beach. But what if your invasion was too late?

Sometimes, you needed to cut corners. Sometimes you had to take more risks. Such as now.

He looked up.

“Okay, here’s the way we play it. We’re landing in Durban on the twentieth, but with only two brigades plus the Commando. The third will have to follow when it can.” He looked at his shocked staff.

“All right, gentlemen. We’re under way in three days for Durban. Start loading. ”

DECEMBER
17-
HEADQUARTERS
,
CUBAN
EXPEDITIONARY
FORCE
,
POTGIETERSRUS

“Every piece of data we have indicates the imperialists will land at

Durban, Comrade General. ” Colonel Vasquez pointed to the map.

“It has the best beaches and port facilities in all of South Africa. Plus, we know that the Boers have had a very difficult time with civil unrest and guerrillas in the area.”

He hesitated and then went on, “Durban is also too far away for us to do anything to interfere with their invasion.”

“Agreed, Colonel. An excellent analysis.” Vega looked disgusted.

“Now tell me what we can do with this fact.”

Up to now, this war had been fought on land and in the air. By adding a naval dimension, the Western allies had given themselves a freedom that neither Cuba or South Africa could hope to match. Operating without interference off the coast, the Allies could cause both belligerents great pain.

Even the Soviet Navy could not challenge the Western ships off the Natal coast. The Soviets did not want to risk a direct war with America and

Britain. They were willing to spend a few rubles and out-of-date equipment, but spilling Russian blood was out of the question.

Part of their reluctance to confront the West was certainly because of the distance from Russia’s ports. Their navy was structured for operations close to Soviet shores, in combination with land-based aircraft. Their chances of success against two carrier battle groups were just about nil.

Vega suspected that Castro hadn’t even bothered to ask for the Soviet

Union’s help. Just as well, anyway, he thought, They would only have refused us.