spreading themselves throughout the country and defending every village, hill,
and potential beach landing site, the Soviets instead appeared to be
maintaining a conservative defense of centralized strong-points, around Narvik
and the airfields at Evanskjaer, Andseiv, and on the island of Andoya. The
Marines encountered little resistance at first, though light artillery and
mortar fire from Tennevik caused some casualties before being silenced by
helicopter gunships and it was evening before Andoya was reported secure. The
heaviest losses were suffered when rising winds and sea swells swamped two
LVTP-7s, and there was a sharp fight in the Vagsfjord port of Harstad before
Huey Cobras moved against the defenses with rocket and machine gun fire.
Harstad was in American hands by 1800 hours. RLTs ferried inland by
helicopter secured key sections of the E-6 road net north of Narvik, at
Bjerkvik and, Fossbakken, and by early evening, most of the peninsula jutting
west from the mainland was in American hands. Marine units were positioned
within sight of Narvik itself, in the hills south of Bogen on the north edge
of the Ofotfjord. The first serious fighting of the day occurred at 1830
hours, when 2nd LAV Battalion antitank vehicles tangled with a platoon of
Soviet T-72s just outside of Narvik. Four of the thin-skinned LAVs were
knocked out, exchanged for two T-72s, but the follow-up air strike by Huey
Cobras firing TOW missiles killed six more Russian tanks before they could
retire.
Meanwhile, the Marines–a full division of them, some seventeen thousand
strong–kept coming ashore.
The Soviets could no longer challenge the Navy or the Marines for control
of the skies. Air strikes by A-6 Intruders and both Marine and Navy Hornets
knocked Soviet tanks off the roads as fast as Marine spotters could call in
their positions, and the black pall of smoke rising from an enemy fuel depot
outside Narvik suggested that they would soon be in deep trouble if they did
not get help from somewhere.
There was one obvious source for that help … and a single remaining
opportunity for the Soviet militarists. The Baltic Fleet remained off Bergen,
perfectly positioned for a strike at the Marine landing forces four hundred
miles to the north.
In Moscow, Vorobyev and the marshals agreed that the risk was worth
taking. Even yet, success against the Americans could deliver all of
Scandinavia into Soviet hands. All it would take was speed, decision, and a
little daring.
Late on the twenty-fifth, at Vorobyev’s command, the machinery was set in
motion.
2030 hours Zulu (2130 hours Zone), 25 June
Soviet Aircraft Carrier Kreml, Baltic Red Banner Fleet
The Norwegian Sea
Outside the portholes of Admiral Yuri Vasilievich Ivanov’s office aboard
the Kreml, the wind shrieked and howled in the first gusts of a storm sweeping
down from the northwest, as raindrops splattered against the glass. On his
desk, a large-scale map of the Norway coast had been spread out over the
clutter of papers and reports that normally covered it. Neatly penciled
notations in Cyrillic characters marked known ship locations and the reported
landings near Narvik by thousands of U.S. Marines.
Ivanov stared at the orders in his hand, reading the words again,
digesting them. A stronger storm, it seemed, was brewing in Moscow. Vorobyev
was angry, and hesitation or vacillation on Ivanov’s part would clearly mean
the end of his career–one way or the other. The man expects the impossible,
Ivanov thought. He waits until Soyuz is lost and Khenkin is dead, waits until
the American Marines are already ashore, and then he sends … this.
Vorobyev’s directions were explicit. Attack American operations in
Narvik area in coordination with Red Banner Northern Task Group Kiev. Execute
immediate.
There could be no more delay.
For three days, Ivanov had held back the Red Banner Baltic Fleet on the
pretense of blockading the approaches to Stavanger and Bergen–the two largest
and most important cities still in free Norwegian hands. It had not been
clear, after all, how the enemy’s strategy would unfold, and most of Ivanov’s
staff advisors had felt that the American Marines were heading for Bergen,
where they could go ashore at a friendly port and deploy to help stiffen the
Norwegian resistance.