Dragonfire by Humphrey Hawksley

Author:Humphrey Hawksley [Hawksley, Humphrey]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781447217329
Publisher: Pan Macmillan UK

India–Pakistan Border, Rajasthan

Local time: 0400 Sunday 6 May 2007

GMT: 2230 Saturday 5 May 2007

‘Ready to move, General?’ The voice of Corporal Vasant Kaul in Gurjit Singh’s headphones told him the corps was ready to advance.

Instead of replying directly, Gurjit Singh tapped Kaul’s shoulder with his boot, gave the thumbs-up sign, and the tank lurched forward. It was a breathtaking sight, line after line of armour turning the sand of the Thar Desert into a huge dustcloud covering 100 kilometres from end to end. Thirty minutes earlier, ground-attack aircraft had blasted a path through the minefields, so that each of Gurjit Singh’s five sector commanders would have a clear path through.

Silk sector took the road through Madargh towards Mirbur Marthelo. Cotton was next through Sandhi towards Ubauro. Gurjit Singh himself was Leather sector, with the road to Sadiqabad. But he would turn south well before that to take Walhar. Wool and Calfskin sectors broke through the border together and separated where the road split just before Islamgarth, bypassing the town. Wool headed towards ruins of Baghla south of Rahimyar Khan. Calfskin advanced more directly north towards Khanpur. As each armoured column finished crossing the border, infantrymen stuck a signboard in the sand saying, ‘Welcome to Indian-administered Pakistan.’

But the euphoria was short-lived. The tank commanders were faced with a depressing tableau of the destruction caused by the artillery and air bombardments. For the first thirty kilometres (about the range of the barrage) they met no resistance at all. The desert around them was a smouldering graveyard of charred bodies, destroyed vehicles and arid ground. After the banter of pre-battle nerves, the advance into Pakistan was a disheartening anti-climax. They drove along a moonscape of craters gouged out of the earth by artillery shells, their radios mostly quiet, except for a steady bleep, every fifteen seconds, to tell them that the lines were still secure.

Thirty-five kilometres in, Leather sector sighted the first enemy position. ‘Contact dug-in infantry,’ said a tank commander. ‘Contact. My tanks have engaged.’

The other sectors continued the advance.

‘No return fire,’ said the commander. ‘White flags. Platoon-size position.’

Ten minutes later Silk sector reported coming under attack: ‘One tank hit. Hand-held anti-tank weapon . . . bunker destroyed.’

‘Casualties?’ asked Gurjit Singh.

‘Two dead. The tank commander seriously injured.’

‘Damn!’ he snarled, knowing that men would be killed, but angered by the first news of casualties.

Similar skirmishes broke out throughout the afternoon. Prisoners were taken. Bunkers were destroyed. The attacks appeared to be random, as if the whole of the Pakistani command and control system had broken down and individual soldiers had been left to fight wherever they saw fit. Indian aircraft flew overhead with control of the skies. Helicopter crews had the most dangerous assignments, flying into far forward positions to test the enemy fire and reporting back.

‘Continue to avoid civilian population centres,’ ordered Gurjit Singh. ‘But armour remains a threat and must be engaged when seen.’

In the first six hours of the assault, the Pakistani vanguard troops shot down three helicopters and damaged five others with machine-gun fire.

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