Operation Desert Fox — Mercedes Lackey

Just because Bachman's World was back-of-beyond of nowhere, and even the most conservative of military planners thought their insistence on having an on-planet defense force to be paranoid in the extreme, that did not negate their right to have it. The law was on their side. But a creative military bean-counter found a cheap solution. Instead of sending the requested Reserve battalion, he sent one man and an outmoded Bolo.

This story was originally published in HONOR OF THE REGIMENT: BOLOS, BOOK I, Sep 1993.