Free ' The Longest Night ' & ' Crossing the Rubicon ': The Original Map Illustrated and Uncut Final Volume (Armageddon's Song) by Andy Farman Page B

a, thankfully short, nuclear winter and allowed the grass surface to be used by other Transall, Sherpa and C-130 Hercules. Once the thaw arrived of course it quickly became a quagmire, and with that the use by fixed wing aircraft had ended.
    Beyond the airfields perimeter the Luftwaffe research centre was long gone, shattered by a series of US 8 th Air Force raids in 1944 although the forest grew back over the decades and still remains today. There have been some incursions by farmers and housing developments since the 1970s, but the forest still extends east over the foothills to the banks of the Elbe.
    South and east of the traffic post lay more forest, dark, wet and a little intimidating. An enemy could approach to within a few meters of the elevated autobahn from that direction. Trip-flares had been comprehensively sited amongst the trees and registered with fire by the heaviest weapons at the junction. Two GPMG s in the SF, Sustained Fire role, and manned by the infantry co-located with them to defend against the last of the Russian airborne troops still loose in small groups, those same ones who stubbornly refused to be mopped-up, contrary to continuous reports by the media.  Thus far there had only been one triggering of a tripflare in the forest and that had introduced a bit of fresh meat into their diet, wild boar tenderised 7.62 style.
    In addition to the gun groups there were two light anti-tank teams also, provided by 13 and 14 Platoons of D Company, 1 Wessex, and these covered the approaching traffic from the east and west, dug into the grassy verge beside the roadway whilst the two platoons had the additional tasks of covering the north/south running expressway.
    The towpaths beside the canal had sappers from 25 Engineer Regiment RE dug in there in the infantry role to prevent any interference with their demolition charges, charges set in prefabricated bore holes that were set to drop a long section of the autobahn into the canal if called upon.
    Post war construction and reconstruction in the former West Germany had been undertaken with defence in mind, for instance most of the bridges across the major rivers which had been destroyed by the advancing allies’ air forces or the retreating Wehrmacht were never rebuilt, and those that had been were designed to be demolition friendly.  
    Along the canal to the south lay three other bridges but all quite narrow, a footbridge and two side by side single lane structures which had once upon a time carried rail tracks serving a small barge port, south of the autobahn bridge.  15 Platoon were guarding these along with another section of sappers from 25 Engineer Regiment, whilst D Company headquarters had contrived, as company headquarters are want to do, to set up in the large blue and yellow liveried premises of a well-known Swedish furniture store at a retail park half a mile south along the expressway, where conditions were reported to be hellishly comfortable.
    The Bundeswehr had responsibility for the defence of the airfield abutting the north east of the autobahn and expressway junction, but it still left a mere seventy three men and women to prevent a mile and a half of key real estate from falling into enemy hands.
      Two junior NCOs were shaken awake; the cold and wet rainwater running down the sleeve of a wet proof jacket assisted the process of rousing both soldiers who had only been relieved as pointsmen barely half an hour before. Lance Corporal Maggie Hebden opened one eye, frowning in irritation.
    “Whoever it is, I just came off a twelve hour stag so fuck off!”
    Her tormentor pulled the zipper of her sleeping bag roughly down its entire length, spilling out the warmth that had accumulated there.
    “Route maintenance….there’s signs missing apparently and a couple of packets nearly went astray down the road so get yer arse out of yer maggot now! ” growled the section commander “The sooner it’s done, the sooner you can get back to