In the fictional universe of World War Z, the Battle of Yonkers was the United States Military's first large scale, official engagement of the Zombie Wars. It took place in Yonkers, New York, a suburb of New York City. The battle was a complete and total catastrophe. In the book, U.S. Infantryman Todd Wainio narrates the events of the battle.

Synopsis

Prelude

The first zombie outbreaks of the war began in China, and quickly spread across the globe. The spread of the zombies slowed during the winter of this first year, during which time the placebo-vaccine "Phalanx" was distributed to the public, who still thought the new plague was a new form of rabies. During this time, elite special forces units known as "Alpha Teams" were covertly used against the undead in isolated infestations. Although the actions carried out by the Alpha Teams are still classified, they were highly succesful at erradicating these initial sporadic zombie outbreaks. However, the Alpha Teams were only originally meant as a stop-gap measure until the regular army could be mobilized to full-scale war levels, an action which was never taken because many were unwilling to believe the true nature of the undead plague. Eventually, the number of zombies began increasing exponentially.

Later that spring a female journalist in the USA publicly released the truth: that Phalanx was a placebo offering no protection against the virus whatsoever, and that the virus was re-animating dead corpses into mindless cannibals who fed on the living. This sparked the "Great Panic", when the public at large realized the situation they were faced with. The spread of the zombies quickly spiralled out of control, and New York City was overrun, as cable news networks showed video nationwide of waves of zombies pushing through the streets as civilians desperately fought hand to hand with them until the city was totally overwhelmed. The Battle of Yonkers would begin 3 months after the start of the "Great Panic", after the fall of New York City, in an attempt to destroy the zombie horde numbering in the millions which was now spreading from the city.

While the special forces "Alpha Teams" had been used against select zombie infestations, Yonkers would be the first time an army of regulars had faced them.

The Battle

Elements of the United States Army were deployed along the Saw Mill River Parkway in North Yonkers. While the parkway served as a natural choke point, it made no difference in the final result. Utilizing antiquated tactics dating back to the Cold War, positions were prepared in such ways as digging tank emplacements, building barriers out of sandbags, and in foxholes.

When "Zack" first began to trickle down the freeway, the opening salvos were fired - two MLRS rocket barrages which did destroy a significant percentage of the first wave. As the undead became more tightly packed, the MLRS lost effectiveness, with the thick swarms of zombies reducing the possibility of a head wound. The second barrage came from M109 Paladin artillery stationed on a hill to the rear of the infantry. They fired fragmentation shells which had even less of an effect than the MLRS barrages. The artillery strikes depended on the "balloon effect," which by proximity to an explosion would cause the liquid in the victim's body to burst. This did not occur, however, because of the zombie's coagulated blood. Therefore, SNT (Sudden Nerve Trauma), which "just shuts down vital organs like God flickin' a light switch," did not happen either.<ref>Max Brooks, World War Z, (New York: Crown Publishers, 2006) 98.</ref>

After this, the infantry, armor and air support opened fire on the "river of undead". Firing on the zombies were the full military might of the United States army: M1 Abrams tanks, M2 Bradleys, Humvees, mortars and several RAH-66 Comanche helicopters. All of these held sustained fire for a time in what was likened to "a meatgrinder, or a wood chipper..."<ref>Brooks 98.</ref> until the anti-personnel ammunition ran out. In fact, little of it had even been provided for the tanks. The armor and helicopters then switched over to Anti-Tank rounds like HEAT or Sabot shells which had little to no effect on the swelling tide of undead.

The infantry were left fighting the undead in close proximity, and there were even zombies in the houses behind the front line of infantry. Other soldiers could see everything through the weapon mounted cameras of the front-line soldiers (thanks to the Land Warrior system); the hordes closing in, their fellow soldiers falling and being eaten alive and even reports of zombies not dying when being shot in the head (this was however noted to have happened because the rounds grazed their head). Joint Strike Fighter launched AGM-154 Joint Standoff Weapon, dropping hundreds of thousands of explosive devices. This decimated the oncoming wave but even more shuffled to take their place. At that point the battle turned into utter chaos, as the soldiers on the ground saw an oncoming wave of millions more zombies emerging from the smoke clouds that had taken out the first several thousand. In a notable act of desperation, Waino recounts that one helicopter gunship bravely tried to buy time for infantry on the ground to retreat by flying low towards the zombie hoarde with its rotary blades tipped foward; this sliced through many zombies and slowed their advance for 2 or 3 precious minutes, but then one of the helicopter's blades hit a wrecked car, causing it to crash and explode.

News crews clambered over one another to get away from the coming onslaught and military personnel sought refuge anywhere they could from the zombies. The air force dropped several thermobaric weapons on the zombies and their own troops hoping to neutralize the undead at Yonkers in one sweep. It accomplished its purpose of destroying the majority of zombies from that battle but many more still poured in from Manhattan, overpowering the American forces and proving, to devastating effect, that the war with the undead could not be won with conventional tactics.

What went wrong

The Battle of Yonkers was an unmitigated disaster for the military. Public confidence in them and the United States Government was shattered, and this contributed heavily to the Great Panic that soon followed and claimed the lives of many more Americans.

Tactics

The tactics used by the army dated back to plans against the Soviet Union during the Cold War. Expecting to fight another organized army, the military leadership ignored the new, untested nature of the undead enemy. Instead of placing infantry in positions of overwatch and in elevated areas with excellent lines of fire, the soldiers were forced to fight on the ground and were quickly overrun. The higher-ups failed to prepare for what was essentially a human wave attack, and should have had fewer men on the ground and more indirect fire units.
The soldiers were also outfitted with "Land Warrior" gear which, amongst other things, provided each soldier with a radar readout of the surrounding area for miles around. This included the hordes of zombies that started coming soon after the battle began. Seeing the thousands of zombies, many soldiers lost their cool and would use the Land Warrior communication uplink (this allowed each soldier to share communications) to share frantic shouts and hurried claims once they started being overrun. The soldiers used foxholes, of all things, as part of what the commanders said was a "concealment" tecnique, but popular consensus is that all the fancy equipment, foxholes, everything was to put on a show to the American people.

Equipment

The soldiers were ordered to wear protective MOPP gear, (used in case of chemical or biological warfare) which greatly impairs one's ability to fight by restricting eyesight, range of motion and respiration. The Land Warrior system, which effectively connected each soldier to every other by use of video cameras, proved a fatal mistake: morale disintegrated soon after soldiers watched their brothers-in-arms being eaten alive.

The conventional anti-tank ordnance was also useless against an army of zombies, as many of the depleted uranium rounds had no effect but to fly straight through the undead and pass harmlessly to the rear of the advancing mass. The men in charge of the battle failed to properly equip their forces for anti-infantry operations; from the outset, anti-tank weaponry should have been discarded, and AFVs loaded with HEI-T (High Explosive Incendiary, Tracer) rounds.

Press Coverage

It is said that "there must have been at least one reporter for every two or three uniforms."<ref>Brooks 95.</ref> This is obviously an exaggeration, but not far from the truth: "prewar records have shown Yonkers to have the highest press-to-military ratio of any battle previously fought."<ref>Brooks 95.</ref> These news crews had been present to document the United States' decisive victory over the undead. As it turned out, however, they just served as a precursor to the rest of the War.

Notes

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