Task Force Anvil
Strategic Expeditionary Landing Field (SELF), Twentynine Palms, CA
Only about forty miles by air from the fighting on I-10, the Marines at Twentynine Palms had been supporting the other troops defending Southern California, but with limited armor and air support, their ability to support those troops had been constrained. That situation was rapidly changing, however. Fawkes watched silently as yet another C-17 came in for a landing at SELF. An expeditionary landing field meant that SELF was completely composed of AM-2 aluminum panels. It had originally been constructed as a training site to teach Marine Corps and allied pilots how to land on a temporary airstrip. It was exactly the kind of airstrip that the Marines would construct in the field as needed on an island or other location that didn’t have the logistics to support aircraft or a traditional airport.
Today, it was the closest active runway to the fighting in southern California and was getting over twenty flights a day in support of that operation. The commandant of the Marine Corps had stripped units on the East Coast to the bone and had been sending everything he could think of west. Fawkes was there to meet his new Air Defense Commander (ADC). Fawkes had never worked with an ADC before. Always in prior fights, the USA had unquestioned air superiority. While the Marines had been planning for this day for almost four years, it was very intimidating to think that they would be going into battle shortly without friendly air cover overhead—something that the USMC had not done since WWII, and even then, they normally had good air support from the Navy.
As troops started filing off the huge C-17, Fawkes saw the Marine officer he was looking for. “Major Konicky, over here!” Returning the major’s salute, he walked him back to the JLTV. “Welcome to California, Konicky. We’re glad you’re here.”
“About damn time the Pentagon got their thumb out of their ass. Half of my battalion is still in Okinawa, or was until they got orders to deploy. The rest are coming in today.”
The JLTV was speeding along a dusty road, headed for a remote building where the mission briefing was going to take place. It had been decided to stay away from the main installation at Twentynine Palms since it had already been attacked several times. Luckily, it was a sprawling facility with plenty of random buildings spread out over one thousand square miles. Plenty of room to spread out and make the enemy’s job harder. There was some friendly air cover overhead which meant a full-on bomber attack wasn’t likely but that didn’t rule out drones or missiles, both of which had been used against the base already.
As they pulled up to the building, an MV-22 Osprey came in for a landing and a US Army lieutenant colonel stepped out, flanked by two armed Army enlisted soldiers. They were all wearing helmets and body armor. They were also filthy, they had obviously been in the thick of things. Fawkes walked over and returned the Army officer’s brief salute. You normally didn’t salute in a combat situation, but apparently the Army officer felt it was safe enough here away from the front lines. Fawkes extended a hand. “Fawkes, glad you could join us, Colonel.”
“Aliston. I’m just glad you are here. We are about at the end of our string. We are past due for relief.”
Fawkes looked down. “I’m afraid that my orders are not to relieve you. I have a different mission.”
“What?!” Aliston stopped dead in his tracks. “What the fuck did you say?”
Fawkes could see that this man had been under fire for some time. His unit had taken the brunt of the Chinese thrust up I-10. He could sympathize but the larger picture was that the only way to really stop this thing was to close off the supply line. “Colonel, please come into the briefing. I will explain.”
Forty minutes later, Aliston was still angry. “There is no fucking way my men can hold for five more days. Hell, I’d be surprised if we can hold for five more hours. The airborne insertion on the fifteen and the Navy support on the five means that the Chinese have shifted the bulk of their attack right fucking here.” For emphasis he pounded the map, vaguely in the area of Cabazon where his men had spent three days in a desperate action to hold the line. “If you go into Mexico now, you’ll have to fight your way back to Los Angeles because the ChiComs will be behind you!”
None of the officers at the map table noticed when the door opened. Suddenly, a gunnery sergeant standing on the other side of the table stiffened, bracing to attention. “Room ATTENTION!”
Everyone in the room stopped what they were doing and braced to attention, facing the door. Three men entered, one a US Navy admiral wearing the NWU III green camouflage used by the Navy. The name tape on his camouflage uniform said “Lensten.” “As you were.” Lensten walked over to Lt. Colonel Aliston. “You Aliston?”
“Sir, yes sir!”
He handed a box to Aliston. “Congratulations and thank you.”
Opening the box, Aliston could see a silver star, one of the highest awards for bravery in the US military. “Sir, my men deserve this, not me.”
“Don’t worry, we’ll take care of them. We heard about your stunt on the top of the casino.” Lensten turned to Colonel Fawkes. “His command post was on top of this big ass building right in the middle of Cabazon. They took two missiles right up the gut, blew the hell out of everything. Aliston called in a fire mission to stop the enemy advance despite being wounded and then carried two wounded soldiers down six flights of stairs. We only found out because the wounded got evac’d to one of the LPDs offshore.”
Aliston was obviously embarrassed. “Sir, I…”
Lensten turned back. “You’re not going to call a brother officer a liar, are you Colonel?”
“No, sir.”
“Good. Let’s get on with it.” He gestured to Peters. “This is Captain Peters, he is on my direct staff and is driving mission planning and running Red Team for me. He will be your direct liaison to West.” He pointed to Bustamante. “Commander Bustamante, Mexican Marine Corps. He will be your liaison in Mexico.”
“Sir, aren’t we fighting the Mexicans?”
“No, we’re not and Bustamante is here to make sure that doesn’t happen.” He pointed to Peters. “Captain Peters, you may begin your briefing on Operation Doolittle.” With a final nod, Lensten headed to the door, security detail in tow.
Two hours later, Aliston was shaking his head. “Even if you have air cover, you are going to get murdered by drones. We have seen waves of over one hundred. You can try going after them with squad weapons, but it’s a crap shoot. We’ve started just taking cover when they show up.”
Konicky raised his hand. “Yo! That’s my department. I can’t handle fast movers, but down low and slow we got you.”
Aliston just looked at the Marine major for a moment. “I’ve got over a hundred dead soldiers from drones alone, Major.”
“Yes, sir. My brother Marines are getting hit hard too. We’re here now, sir. We got this.”
Aliston looked at Peters. The captain wasn’t wearing his “rack” of medals on his combat fatigues of course, but he was wearing three “flashes” on his shoulder. Not many captains had the triple threat of Special Forces, Ranger and Airborne on their shoulders. “Where were you during the last one, Peters?” If he was going to risk his life and the lives of all his soldiers, he wanted to know what moron thought up this plan.
“Twenty-five miles north of the DMZ when the balloon went up. Then we hooked up with the 3-67 for the trip north.”
Aliston just looked at Peters for a moment, trying to decide if Peters was telling the truth. “You’re Ghostwalker Six.”
“For my sins, yes.”
The entire Army knew about the insane Green Beret operation that had saved the entire mission to invade North Korea during the South China Sea war (which had started with what was commonly referred to as “The Kidd Incident”). The Green Beret team had been inserted behind enemy lines and then directed the 3rd Battalion, 67th armor safely through the DMZ. By doing so they had saved thousands of soldiers through sheer balls and determination. It was easily the most famous Army operation since WWII. But nobody knew the name of the Special Forces captain who led the team. He was simply known as “Ghostwalker Six” which was his code name during the operation. Aliston looked at the other officers in the room. They nodded in turn. “OK, I’m in.”