Chapter 3: Orders to War

July 21, 1994

Colonel Naff stood atop a building watching the action below. The first battalion had just jumped into a fake urban area used in making a television show. The set was complete with buildings, although they were just shells. They were now in the process of taking control of the area.

One of the problems facing paratroopers is that when they jump into a war zone they are doing so with limited supplies. There isn’t a convoy of supply trucks lumbering along behind them with heavy weapons, food, and loads of ammunition. That convoy wouldn’t show up until the regular troops caught up with them.

Paratroopers are stuck with what they could carry. For the most part, they carried a few days worth of food with them in the hope that they could gain control of an area where fresh supplies could be provided. They were armed with their rifles, but carried a limited amount of ammunition.

Historically, paratroopers had to march from the drop zone to their destination carrying their supplies with them. Once at their destination, they engaged the enemy and then held the position waiting for the regular troops to arrive. The idea was that they attacked the enemy from the rear while the regular forces attacked from the front. They would meet in the middle and everyone would be happy.

He had discovered that Jade Force had a completely different view of how paratroopers were to be used. Jade Force wasn’t concerned with taking and holding territory. They focused on eliminating the ability of the enemy to wage war. The easiest way to do that, was to prevent the enemy from having access to the supplies necessary for war. The preferred approach was just to steal supplies from the enemy. One of the benefits of this approach was that it was also the easiest way for the paratroopers to replenish their supplies.

Their priorities were to take transportation giving them freedom of movement, arms and munitions giving them the ability to really wage war, and food giving them the ability to survive. It did make the logistics problem of supporting paratroopers a whole lot easier ... and cheaper.

Today, they were being trained to use everything in the environment to their advantage. Their exercise that morning was to take control of nine city blocks and to hold it against a force of men that outnumbered them ten to one. It had started with an early morning drop into a small supply depot that held a couple of trucks and an armory of weapons. They left the armory riding in trucks loaded with heavy weapons. The longest hike from landing to truck: one hundred yards.

At the moment, they were using a stolen garbage truck and a stolen tow truck to reposition parked cars so that they were blocking all intersections into the area. A handful of paratroopers were laying landmines out on the street. They weren’t covered or hidden in any way, but they were just as deadly that way. No one was going to come charging down the street until it was cleared and with the disposition of forces along the tops of the buildings, clearing those landmines would be a chore.

He still couldn’t believe the training program his men were going through. Sword Miquel had his men firing artillery guns, driving trucks, and even learning how to operate a tank. He taught them that any piece of equipment they captured was theirs to use. It didn’t matter if it was military or civilian. He’d even given them lessons on how to steal cars.

Sword Miquel asked, “What do you think? Could they hold that against ten thousand men?”

“It would be tough to get ten thousand men in there.”

“Four hours ago, they dropped into the supply depot, and took everything in it. Now they’ve got control of nine city blocks and are in a position to defend that territory against superior forces. I think that is pretty impressive,” Sword Miquel said.

“I agree.”

“Would you say they are the best prepared paratroopers in the world?”

“I think so.”

Each paratrooper had more jumps than most paratroopers in other Armies of the world performed in their entire career. They had a more rigorous field training than most. The weird thing is that they hadn’t had a single man drop out of the training. Maybe it was because they had been paratroopers and failing now would hurt more than not qualifying to be a paratrooper.

“I agree.”

“I have need for two battalions of your men,” Sword Miquel said. “In particular, I want the first and third battalions of your regiment.”

He was requesting the use of the two of the three paratroopers battalions he had been training for the past three months.

“Why not all three?” Colonel Naff asked.

“We only contracted for two thousand men,” Sword Miquel answered.

Colonel Naff edged away from the edge of the building just in case his legs gave out. He knew exactly what Sword Miquel meant. His regiment had been contracted to go into a war zone. The army was about to earn a paycheck. He tried to think of what wars were going on at the moment, but his mind refused to cooperate.

“Where?”

“We’re going to end the Sumar-Desera War.”

As soon as Sword Miquel mentioned the Sumar-Desera War, all of the details of that conflict came flooding in. This was a particularly nasty war that had lasted several years. They had fought across the same turf several times. Just recently, Sumar had been pushed back towards the coast. Desera had captured one of the larger cities. Refugees had fled in the thousands into Gemort.

“I take it that Sumar is the customer?”

“No.”

“Oh,” Colonel Naff said unable to believe that he’d be fighting on the side of the invader.

“You’ll have two weeks to get your men ready. Their mission will be to hold any ground that Jade Force captures.”

“I’ll need more details than that,” Colonel Naff said.

“You’ll get the details as you need them,” Sword Miquel said. “For now, I suggest you look at a map and figure out where the fighting will be. We’ll probably be right in the thick of it.”

“I understand,” Colonel Naff said. “I assume this is all top secret.”

“No.”

“No?”

“I figure that Sumar and Desera will both know about it in a couple of hours from now,” Sword Miquel said. “Pen Sada is going to Amra this evening for an interview about it.”

“I’m sure Desera knows about your involvement. After all, they’re the customer.”

“No. They aren’t,” Sword Miquel said with a grin.

“Who is the customer?”

“Gemort. They’re tired of having to chase down refugees who are crossing their border,” Sword Miquel said.

Gemort was paying Jade Force ten dollars for each refugee brought to a refugee camp. It was a piddling amount of money compared to real cost of operating a camp, but Gemort was tired of paying it. It cost them money to have troops along the border to round up the refugees who crossed the border. It was a tremendous area to cover and that required a lot of resources.

“Gemort? That’s crazy.”

“Pen Sada convinced them that that they would be better off hiring two thousand Misera soldiers than having to deal with all of those refugees.”

“You’re going to fight Sumar and Desera with just two thousand soldiers?”

“More or less. There’ll be a couple Jade Warriors involved.”

“How many?”

“You don’t need to know that.”

“You’re going to take 2,000 soldiers and put them against a half million battle hardened troops.”

“Yes. Do you think we’re using too many?” Sword Miquel asked with a grin.

“No. It’s going to be a massacre.”

There were two huge armies of well over two or three hundred thousand men each facing each other in Sumar. Colonel Naff didn’t see how two thousand Misera soldiers could possibly make a difference to either side. His green troops, no matter how well trained, would be facing battle hardened veterans. They wouldn’t stand a chance.

Sword Miquel said, “Actually, it is a bit of an overkill for what we need. We could probably get by with half that many.”

“I don’t understand.”

“That’s fine. You won’t be the only one who doesn’t understand. It seems to me that Jade Warriors are the only ones left in the world, who truly understand war.”

“This is going to be ugly, isn’t it?”

“I hope not,” Sword Miquel said. “We should be able to end this without having to kill more than ten or twenty thousand people.”

“Only ten or twenty thousand?” Colonel Naff said with a sick feeling in his stomach.

Sword Miquel said, “Ah! I see they’ve set up a mess area with food stolen from the grocery store. They’ve got a pile of steaks, roasts, sausages, chickens, and even a couple of hams. I wonder where they got the grill. I don’t remember setting one out here for them to find. Resourceful little buggers, aren’t they?”

“You’ve turned them into a bunch of thieves. We have regulations against that kind of behavior.”

“It’s called spoils of war. In a war zone, they’d have a feast at no charge to mom and dad back home.”

“May I remind you that mom and dad are paying for this feast,” Colonel Naff said.

Sword Miquel had totally destroyed his annual operating budget with this training program of his. All of that meat the paratroopers had ‘stolen’ from the grocery store had been purchased out of his budget. All of those old cars they were using to create roadblocks had been purchased out of his budget. They even had to rent the movie lot at an outrageous price.

All of those airdrops had cost money. They spent the whole fuel budget for the year in three months, just on refueling the airplanes. They had replaced equipment at an incredible rate. He had purchased more new parachutes in the last three months, than he had in the last five years.

He had wondered why his superiors had not flinched when they had to divert funds to him. Now he knew. The Army was going to get a paycheck. Two thousand men at a thousand dollars per man, per day, was two million dollars a day. It would only take a couple of days for all of the training expenses to be covered.

“I’m going to get something to eat. Are you coming?”

“No. I seem to have lost my appetite.”

The Sumarans were milling around the room, grabbing coffee and cookies, and talking with each other. Basically, they were wondering why so many of them had been called to a public meeting. All of the leaders of the eleven villages were present. Jade Force had never requested the presence of so many people for a meeting, and they weren’t sure what to make of it.

Life for them after coming to Misera had been good. All of them were working. In fact, there were more jobs than there were people. A few folks had gone from job to job until they had found one they liked. Many of the adults were taking classes at night, learning new skills that would give them even greater opportunities.

Their little villages, about three thousand people to a village, had the feel of their villages back at home, only a little bigger. During the daylight hours, people worked either on their jobs or around their home. Most people had a small garden, usually in front of their little houses. It provided fresh vegetables and a reminder of their past. At night, the men met to discuss important matters, the women gathered to discuss items of interest to them, and the children played.