*[To anyone reading my review of the first book in this series, I apologize. It had way, way too many spelling errors that I did not correct and was way too long. Sorry, I guess I was too excited when I wrote that review. It’s been corrected! – Jim C]*
As I said for the first book in this series, this is a fantastic series that you must read if you’re anywhere close to being interested in military science fiction. This brings back so many memories I personally have while I was doing my time in the US Army. I wasn’t a tanker or a pilot, but I knew how to put steel on target with my artillery battalion. In this book, some of the operations are very realistic although much more futuristic than anything I experienced.
Captain Mike Sandhurst is now the commander of the 175th Regimental Cavalry Troop. He’s at the tip of the spear when they go into attack and he knows it. Fortunately, he acquired former Captain now Major Davies tank which came with a very well trained crew. So, now all Mike has to worry about is the training of his subordinate Lieutenants and making sure his unit operates as a team. He doesn’t know how soon they will have to go into action, but he knows it going to be very soon.
As you know, Mike had met up with some of the pilots flying Ospreys which had conducted some much needed close air support in the first book and their last action. It was the first time that the Space Force/Air Force had actually bothered coordinating their actions with what was going on on the ground. They had so much success that the bosses above them were happy to see this kind of coordination continue even thought some thought that the Osprey wasn’t the best airframe for that job. Still, it’s what they had so they got it done.
This is until Lieutenant Commander Steuben showed up in VXA-101 Thunderbolts Squadron. He was the newly assigned XO even thought Commander Strunk definitely wanted his maintenance chief, Lieutenant Commander Fujita in the position. But somehow, the higher ups had sent Steuben and he was causing a lot of problems. He specifically didn’t like how the Osprey was being used in close air support and was going to figure out a way to stop those missions. He was going to be a lot of trouble for everyone.
Lieutenant Vivian Llewelyn, a.k.a. “Hellcat”, was one of the pilots scheduled to go up and provide close air support for that day. She in her aircraft went by the callsign of Bolt 503 and she would eventually get into a lot of trouble which caused a lot of people to start scrambling. A downed pilot is one that everyone wants to recover no matter the cost if at all possible. To say that Captain Sandhurst wanted to be the one to rescue Hellcat would be an understatement. As things work out, he and his unit get heavily involved.
In the meantime, all the intelligence assets are trying to figure out what the Buzzers were up to. They were creating gravimetric anomalies all over the place. Commander Kathy March had been assigned by the GTF Forces Commander to find out what they meant. So, she was going down to the ground to do just that. Although she was normal a qualified pilot, she excelled at putting intelligence information together. The best way she thought to figure this stuff out was to be where it was happening so she showed at the TOC of the 157th Tank Regiment. Then she was going to spend some time in Major Davies Tank which was going to be a very interesting development.
I like that the various levels of command are addressed and they speak to each other using what I’d call normal radio traffic. I believe a lot of their over the air transmission are secured which is something we didn’t have in my days. Everything we said had to be encoded or spoken around about without giving away what you were talking about. Here in this book they are more free in their conversations. Listening to radio traffic is something someone gets very used to while living an a Tactical Operations Center.
This book describes only one operation on the planet Heske. No one knows what the Buzzers are up to but it looks like this could be a very long war. And I like that just so I can read more of these books. The next book, “Sound the Charge”, is now out on Amazon and already on my reading list.