by Ward Carroll
“That’s entirely fair, sir,” Punk said as he started to shut the door.
“This is my only warning,” the man cautioned.
“I’m sure we understand completely,” Punk replied. “You’ll have no trouble from us. We’re Americans.” He closed the door and, through the peephole, watched the Arab walk away.
Punk turned from the door, walked across the room, and took a seat on one of the couches away from most of the activity. He watched the circus around him and, in his pensive state, wrestled with how to characterize the scene. Something bumped the couch from behind. He peered over the back of it and was greeted by Weezer’s hair-covered buttocks. Punk was about to douse him with a beer when he noticed a girl’s face across Weezer’s shoulder. Her eyes were shut, and she appeared otherwise happy with her situation, so Punk quietly slinked away and took up a station on the other side of the room.
He slouched in a chair and felt the pill he’d just swallowed disburse its cool salvation, starting with his extremities and slowly working inward toward his torso. He took another gulp of beer, and felt his heart pound, but at the same time, he noticed he was graying out. His mind gave orders, but his flesh ignored them in the name of the more pressing issues of regeneration. The evening was finally taking its toll with an abrupt pace. The last thing Punk saw before he passed out with a crooked smile was one of the girls hauling Scooter’s pants down while another slathered him with a light brown goo that he guessed was peanut butter.
Punk was awakened by the report of a pistol. He shot up from his supine position on the chair and tried to assess where the distinct pop had originated. It was a sound like no other, one he’d first heard up-close during plebe summer training at Annapolis. He wondered how long he’d slept and noted 9:01 on a nearby digital clock.
While still clearing the cobwebs left from a hard slumber, he traced the commotion to the television. Through bleary eyes, he could just make out the scene. The footage began with a handful of men in blue windbreakers—United Nations inspectors—and twice as many military troops handing documents back and forth while huddled at a large iron gate in front of a nondescript warehouse. A discussion turned into an argument. The senior military figure, evidenced by his beret, pushed the documents into the chest of the man in a windbreaker in front of him. In return, the man in the windbreaker, a large man who stood a full six inches taller than anyone around him, shoved the papers back into the chest of the military man, a blow that caused the mustachioed soldier to fall back against the troops behind him. The soldier threw the documents into the air and rushed the tall man. Framed by documents descending like mammoth snowflakes, a melee ensued, punctuated by the gunshot. And then the crowd scattered, revealing the tall man crumpling to the ground. The video clip was repeated over and over in an endless loop.
Punk concentrated on the commentary: “. . . and we’re not sure who fired the shot, but one could naturally assume it was one of the Iraqi troops. Again, U.N. Inspector James Gleason has been shot and killed during a routine site visit. We’re standing by for reaction from the White House.”
Spud came out of the bedroom, as groomed and pressed as an acolyte. The lieutenant commander stood before his hung-over pilot and delivered a short message: “Liberty’s over.”
SIX
“Don’t you ever get sick of this movie?” Punk asked Spud from behind the duty desk in the ready room, a room lighted only by the light flickering on the screen.
“Don’t you guys ever get sick of asking me if I ever get sick of this movie?” Spud asked back sardonically. “Cheers for Reggie is, quite frankly, a cinematic achievement nonpareil. Each time I watch it, I see something different or something I’d never noticed before: some twist in the plot, something in a character’s voice inflection, something in a scene’s setting. It’s pure magic.”
“Spud, Cheers for Reggie is a sophomoric B-comedy about a guy losing his virginity to a whore.”
“I see . . . and basketball is nothing but guys throwing a ball through a hoop.”
“That’s a terrible analogy.”
“And how did this so-called B-comedy get to be a cult classic?”
“What cult? You?”
“Since when did you turn so sour on Cheers for Reggie? If my memory serves me correctly, last time we watched it you were repeating the script line for line.” Spud paused and exaggeratedly scratched his chin in thought. “So what’s different now? Gee, maybe it’s the fact you’ve been the squadron duty officer for almost two weeks straight, and here it is: eleven P.M., the end of another long flying day? I think you’re getting a little punchy.”
“I’m not punchy,” Punk returned. “I’m just sick of sitting here watching other guys go flying.”
“That’s why we call the duty desk ‘the healing chair,’” Spud said. “Guys tend to get better a lot faster when they’re faced with the prospect of having the duty day in and day out.”
“Look, Spud,” Punk replied with irritation in his voice, “I’m med down because of my ankle, and I’m awaiting the final recommendation from the chain of command on our board. That’s it. No more and no less.”
“You could save the chain of command a lot of trouble and just turn in your wings now,” Spud suggested.
Punk looked down his nose at the gold-plated device pinned above the left pocket of his working khakis and quipped, “No, I’ll let the write-ups take care of that.” He raised his head and asked, “How long until this is resolved for good? It seems like it’s been hanging over our heads for months now.”
“Well, we just gave our testimony a couple of weeks ago and the board’s report is already on the streets,” Spud said. “Trust me, that’s quick. I believe they received some executive-level guidance on resolving this one in a hurry because of this pending war we’ve got here. That’s also what kept us from going to admiral’s mast. We don’t have an unlimited supply of aviators out here, and the admiral needs us flying. Thank your lucky stars, boy. You picked the perfect time to crash.”
“I feel great now,” Punk said. “Thanks . . .”
“Have you seen the skipper’s endorsement?”
“No,” Punk answered. “It’s not out yet, is it?”
“No,” Spud said, “but Turtle gave me a draft copy . . .”
“Well, damn, Spud. Let me see it.”
“Not until the movie’s over.”
“You forget that I have control of the VCR here at the duty desk,” Punk said. “I can end your bliss in short order.”
“All right, all right. Here.” Spud removed some papers from the stack on his lap and spun them the short distance to the desk; in spite of the poor lighting, Punk managed to catch the sheets between his palms. The lieutenant illuminated the desk’s sole fluorescent bulb, centered the pages under it, and began to read with the same feeling he used to get before opening his report card back in grade school.
He skimmed over the report, through the statistics and basic narrative of the mishap, until he got to Findings. At that point, he carefully studied each word.
“Aircrew error—Aircrew failed to manage fuel during cycle, forcing a high-risk bingo profile—Rejected. Do not concur.” The skipper’s endorsement would either concur or not concur with the board’s assessment of each factor that may have led to the crash. In this case, the CO didn’t agree with the board’s finding.
Punk read on: “Although a bingo field, Al Jabar, Kuwait, was briefed, it was also common knowledge within the air wing that the field was not always a reliable alternate. This should have caused the crew to raise their fuel ladder by a safe margin above normal.” What? What the hell was that supposed to mean?
With a quickened pulse, he continued to take in the text: “Aircrew error—Aircrew failed to keep the ship informed of their intentions—Rejected. Do not concur. While the crew claims to have transmitted bingo intentions prior to beginning their profile, they were not understood by those in positions to effect solutions.” Excuse me? In light of the fact that F
uzzy had just taken the barricade and all hell was breaking loose on the flight deck, I thought we made our intentions very clear. And what “solutions” are we talking about here?
“Supervisory error—” Good. Let’s blame somebody else for a while. “The air operations officer did not ensure the briefed bingo field was open during extended flight operations—Accepted. Concur.” Sure, no harm piling on the guy near death.
Punk skipped to the end of the report, the Commanding Officer’s Comments section: “This unfortunate mishap re-emphasizes the need for tactical crews to be prepared to make the correct decision in high-pressure situations. Not only did this crew wait too long to confess their fuel state, they also allowed themselves to be put into a box. Naval aviation is full of gray areas, and in cases such as this one, only the crew can make the right call. This is part of the responsibility that comes with strapping into an aircraft.”
Punk rearranged the sheets and handed them back to Spud. “You’ve read this?”
“Of course,” Spud replied.
“And?”
Like doctor to patient, Spud studied his pilot for a few seconds. “You’ve got that look again.”
“What look?”
“Your look . . . the one you get when you’re convinced you can fix the world.”
“I’m not trying to fix the world,” Punk countered. “I would like to fly again.”
“And you will,” Spud said assuredly. He lowered his right arm and pointed his index finger at Punk. “The race doesn’t always go to the swift.”
“What the hell does that mean? You sound like the skipper’s endorsement.”
Smoke burst through the front door to the ready room followed by the other three members of his event all fresh from the last scheduled flight of the day and still in full gear. Much to Spud’s dismay, Punk brought the house lights back on, while Smoke placed his pistol, two full cartridges, and blood chit on the duty desk.
“The natives are restless,” Smoke said.
“What natives?” Punk asked.
“Those natives,” Smoke returned, gesturing out the door to the great beyond. “The Iraqis. Their ground radars were tracking us all night long.”
“Any shots back at them?” Spud asked.
“Yeah, one of our Prowlers shot a HARM,” Smoke said, referring to the electronic jamming aircraft’s high-speed anti-radiation missile. He arced a parabolic shape with his hand. “That’s the first one I’ve seen fired—actually saw it hit the ground. It was very cool; although, to be honest, I’m not sure we’d met the rules of engagement criteria.”
“What’s to meet?” Scooter said as he pressed behind Smoke to return his pistol, cartridges, and blood chit to Punk. “They lock you up; you shoot back at them.”
“There’s more to it than that and, as the mission commander, I need to ensure that the Prowler had all of the steps in the matrix suitcased.”
“The ROE is so complicated, I’m not sure it can be suitcased,” Scooter added. “Just shoot the damned missiles. Otherwise, the flight is boring as hell.”
“Well, Lord knows we’re here to keep you entertained, Scooter,” Spud said. “You’d better suitcase it before you go lobbing ordnance downrange. We’re claiming the high ground, and if you’re going to be aggressive, you’d better be right.”
“Where’s the skipper?” Smoke asked. “We need to make him smart on this thing before CAG and the admiral grab him.”
“He’s in his stateroom,” Punk replied. “How much flight time are you logging?”
“Three-point-two hours of quality night time.”
“Three-point-two,” Punk repeated as he scribbled the digits down on his tracking sheet. “Gas burned?”
“Sixteen thousand pounds plus ten thousand from the KC-135.”
“Other comments? Any bandit activity?”
“Not a single Iraqi airplane flying anywhere.” Smoke looked toward the large television in the corner of the ready room. “Anything on the news about the situation here?”
“I dunno,” Punk replied. “I’ve been a prisoner of Cheers for Reggie for the last ninety minutes.”
“All right, all right,” Spud said as he rose out of the skipper’s chair. “Turn it off. It’s almost over anyway.” He strolled down the center aisle of the ready room, detouring toward the coffee machine to charge his spill-proof plastic mug. As he snapped the lid back on top of the container and stepped through the doorway, he called back toward the duty desk: “I’m headed for CVIC. If we’re lobbing HARMs, I’d better get down to the mission planning cell and see how my team is doing on tomorrow’s flights. I might not be able to fly right now, but I can still throw in my two cents.”
Punk switched the view through the ceiling-mounted projector from Cheers for Reggie’s final scene to the twenty-four-hour international news. They jumped into the middle of the day’s World Cup soccer highlights, but a few seconds later, a “breaking news” graphic flashed on the screen, followed by a report about the attack on the Iraqi radar site.
“About an hour ago, American warplanes attacked an Iraqi radar site fifty miles southwest of Baghdad,” the white-haired anchorman said.
“Not ‘warplanes,’” Smoke said to the screen. “War . . . plane.”
“Spokesmen at the Pentagon stated that the American crews were simply reacting to hostile actions by the Iraqis,” the anchor continued. “The Iraqi foreign ministry responded that the American attack was blind and unwarranted aggression.”
“Now I feel like my life has meaning again,” Smoke said as he unzipped his G-suit from around his legs and waist and slung it over the back of his ready room chair. “Reporters are back in Baghdad, therefore Baghdad is the news. We might just get our war after all.”
A female correspondent came on the screen, looking earnestly into the camera next to the dark streets of the Iraqi capital. In the background, the illuminated spires of a mosque framed both sides of her rain-soaked head. The wind occasionally flapped the hood of her jacket across her forehead and right eye as she spoke, but she took no notice. “Iraqi leadership has taken a hard line following this latest series of attacks on their radar facilities. The Iraqi foreign minister told reporters here that Iraq will no longer tolerate what he referred to as ‘U.S.–led insults to Iraq,’ and he vowed that Iraq would never back down from their demands for the removal of all U.N. inspection teams and a lifting of economic sanctions.”
The view shifted to a clip of the foreign minister, garbed in olive drab tinged with regalia, speaking before a cluster of microphones in a bleakly appointed room. “The international community demands justice,” the Iraqi said through his close-cropped beard. “The United States cannot use the mask of the U.N. and assign false blame for the death of James Gleason to forward its selfish desires.”
The scene went back to the reporter in Baghdad. “The foreign minister went on to say that Iraq intended to defy all of the provisions of the U.N. agreement against them, including the agreement against flying in the no-fly zone and moving troops and equipment into Southern Iraq. In the latest game of cat-and-mouse between the United States and Iraq, Iraq just might be the cat.”
“Iraq just might be the cat,” Smoke mocked. “Well, bitch, that cat took a big-ass missile down the throat a little while ago.”
“If she wasn’t such a fox, I might really have a problem with her,” Scooter said. “I’ll bet she’d keep the ol’ bunker nice and warm once the bombs started hitting.”
“All right, guys, we’re late for our debrief,” Smoke said to the other aviators from his event. “Let’s get down to the Prowler ready room and piece this thing back together.”
The front door flung open, and the Pats rushed in, breathless from their sprint from CVIC but committed to the delivery of their news, nonetheless: “Some of our jets just attacked a radar site,” one of them cried.
“No kidding?” Smoke deadpanned. “How do you know?”
“We just saw a report on the news down in CVIC.”
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br /> As Smoke started his group on the journey to the Prowler ready room, he thought aloud, “We don’t need all those complicated and expensive intelligence systems down in CVIC, do we? We just need cable TV.”
Punk organized the day’s flight operations summary sheet while half-listening to the increasingly heated discussion on the talk show that had followed the news report. Within minutes, the exchange between the State Department spokesman in the New York studio with the host and the mercurial foreign minister beaming in from Baghdad was compelling enough to eclipse the aviators’ interest in other activities around the ready room. The first two rows of chairs were soon filled with officers hoping to witness an old fashioned tele-fracas.
“So what are we doing in Iraq, Kevin?” the host asked the State Department spokesman. “Do we have a goal there?”
“Our only desire in the region is to carry out the will of the United Nations,” the spokesman said. “I’m not sure where the foreign minister comes up with these accusations about America’s selfish desires in Iraq. The United States is—”
“The United States is only interested in the domination of the entire Middle East,” the foreign minister interrupted from ten thousand miles away. “That’s why a man like James Gleason is made into a so-called inspector.”
“What do you mean, ‘a man like James Gleason,’ Mr. Foreign Minister?” the host asked.
“Please,” the foreign minister returned. “James Gleason, the former member of your Marine Corps, the war criminal from the Desert War of the Martyrs, created confrontations wherever he went in the Middle East. His mission wasn’t to ensure compliance with U.N. charters. It was to harass the peace-loving peoples of Iraq.”
“So that justifies murder?” the spokesman asked.
“It wasn’t murder,” the Iraqi replied. “It was self defense. Watch the tape carefully.” With that, the foreign minister pulled the small monitor out of his left ear and walked out of the view of the camera.
The host, skilled in dealing with the sudden and unplanned loss of a guest, used the opportunity to segue to two other pundits he had waiting in the satellite-facilitated wings. “Gentlemen, is there any merit to the foreign minister’s assertions about self-defense in this case? Paul, let’s hear from you first.”