Proxy War (Vietnam Ground Zero Military Thrillers Book 29) by Eric Helm

Author:Eric Helm [Helm, Eric]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Sapere Books
Published: 2024-07-26T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 11

Major Mack Gerber was early. The meeting was scheduled for 1400 hours, but Gerber found himself in that limbo between when the meeting was to start, and the little time left before he needed to be there. There wasn’t enough time to get anything done, other than walk to the conference room. He thought he might as well wait there as anywhere else. The conference room had air-conditioning while many of the offices and other facilities were just hot.

Gerber sat at the table, reading a newspaper that someone had left in the room. There was a beverage service on the table, but it contained no beverages. He wondered who had forgotten to fill it, and then wondered what he would want in it. Probably just water considering the time of day.

The door opened and Colonel Bates entered. “Comfortable?” he asked.

Gerber started to rise but Bates waved him down. “You’re a bit early.”

“Yes, sir. But, at least, I’m here.”

Bates pulled out the chair at the end of the table, sat down and then set a stack of folders with a “Secret” cover sheet on them in front of him. “I see you have no notes.”

“Don’t need them. This is a planning session where we’re going to be throwing around ideas based on what you tell us today. Bromhead and Martin will be the stars of this show. And Fetterman will have a notepad and pen with him in case we need to write down anything.”

Bates grinned and said, “Shouldn’t you be out painting rocks white or something useful instead of reading a newspaper.”

“To make it worse, the paper is twelve days old. It not so much news as it is now history.”

“Mack, is this a good idea?”

Gerber was surprised at the question. “I’m not sure what you mean, Colonel.”

Bates tapped the folders in front of him. “There is nothing illegal about that camp in Laos. Or rather, we have no authority to do anything about it. The Soviets are there by invitation. At least I believe they were invited in.”

“What is the ultimate purpose?”

“Here we run into a bit of a problem. That earlier recon didn’t tell us much but from the little information I have, they are training the locals in the same way we do here. I don’t know if they plan to engage in combat here in an attempt to establish a camp like those we have done. I don’t know if they are looking to operate here or just in Laos. Our best course of action might be to withdraw our team and pretend that they are not there.”

“I think we would overrun such a camp easily,” said Gerber, unsure of what was bothering Bates.

“The VC and NVA haven’t had much luck in overrunning our camps. They succeeded at Lang Vei because the Marine QRF was tied down at Khe Sanh and the camp was close enough to the border that the NVA brought in tanks.”

“True,” said Gerber, “but we control the air and ground here. Such a camp would be overwhelmed because we could cut the lines of communication.

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