• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 797 0

cap was inserted into the claymore and wired to a nine-volt battery (wrapped in plastic to protect it from the elements), which was itself wired to the switch mechanism. The switch was field expedient–homemade–and consisted of an empty C-ration can, the safety pin from a mortar round, and handle from a white plastic spoon. The wire carrying the electrical current from the battery was rigged to the spoon handle, the tripwire tied through a hole punched in one end with a pocketknife, then stretched across the likeliest avenue of enemy approach and tied to another tree. The tripwire was so thin as to be almost invisible. It was situated about a foot off the ground, and if it was disturbed by a passing foot, bicycle, or animal, the spoon handle would be yanked out of position, allowing the electrical circuit to be completed; if the battery was still good, the claymore mine would go off. Fifteen claymore mines were thus rigged, as were several spare mortar rounds, which had been wrapped with detonation cord. To top it off, fragmentation and white phosphorous hand grenades had been planted in the underbrush, their delayed firing devices unscrewed and replaced with the ones from smoke grenades, which would ignite instantly when their pins, attached to tripwires, were jerked out.

Finally, tripflares were rigged beside the claymores. Lieutenant Cambria moved back down the road and laagered in with his Sheridans and ACAVs deployed in a widely spaced circle among the tree stumps on the north side of the road, each facing forward. Fifty meters from the vehicle farthest from the dirt highway, the wall of jungle sprang back up, and Cambria had the stubby 152mm cannon of one of his two Sheridans facing the most likely route of enemy attack out of the wood line, while the main gun of the other Sheridan was trained down the road toward the creek. The wire of a final tripflare was stretched taut at ankle level across the highway thirty feet from the track facing downrange toward their explosive trapline. This was all standard operating procedure– SOP. As the sun went down, Cambria made sure that he and the mortar track commander plotted defensive concentration fires around their night defensive position and the enemy's most likely approach routes.

The enemy usually came out at night.

Per SOP, at least one man was awake on each vehicle at all times, usually leaning back in the command cupola on top, metal gun shield in front, from which pointed the long, ominous barrel of a .50-caliber machine gun. Some wore a CVC, the combat-vehicle-communications helmet that resembled a football helmet, but with earphones and a micro-phone so the men could whisper to one another during their watch. The platoon frequency on their radios was known as the bullshit net with good reason.

Around midnight, Cambria was asleep after his turn on watch when their farthest claymore suddenly detonated. He stuck his head up through the cargo hatch on the back deck of his track and could see the white glow of the tripflare shining through the trees a half mile away. The air was oppressively hot and heavy, even at night, and there was not a star in the sky. A thick ground fog had rolled in across the road and the tree stumps, and Cambria ordered a fifty-percent alert on each track, meaning that two of each fourman crew should be up manning a machine gun. Then he repositioned himself among the ammunition and supplies in the hull of his own ACAV. An hour or so after nodding off again, he was suddenly awake with a surge of adrenaline that sent him scrambling. Sergeant Rogers, the track commander, was standing in the cupola, hands wrapped around the grips of the .50-cal, thumbs pressed against the butterfly trigger, firing, firing–the noise was like a jackhammer– spilling expended brass and links into the hull. Stark white light flooded the laager from the tripflare staked beside the road. Everyone was shouting. His two M60 machine gunners were also firing. Cambria got his head up through the cargo hatch behind the cupola. Tracers poured from the Sheridan and ACAV machine