Force of Eagles

by Richard Herman

  The pilot in Scamp 13 now taxied across the runway and onto the open flat area next to the runway. After landing with the Rangers he and another C-130 pilot had driven around the field in a jeep and staked out a long stretch of dirt that could be used as a makeshift runway. He lined up and ran up his engines, sending a cloud of dirt and dust out behind him, then he started his takeoff roll. But before he reached lift-off speed a barrage of mortars walked across in front of him, he tried to dodge a crater but it was too late. The left main gear of the Hercules sank into the mortar’s crater. The crater was a minor obstacle for the gear to handle, but the left wing tip dipped too low and the number-one prop hit the ground. The plane wrenched to the left as the prop broke off the engine and smashed into number-two prop. Propeller fragments ripped into the fuselage as the pilot fought to bring the plane to a halt. The engineer pulled the emergency tee-handles on the fire emergency control panel for one and two, shooting the fire extinguishers in each engine and cutting off all fuel flow, which saved the crew.

  The two props on the right were still spinning down when the five men jumped out of the plane and ran for cover…

  Furry scrambled out of a ditch when he thought the attack was over and jogged for his F-15. Another mortar round exploded behind him, knocking him down.

  *

  “Lifter, tell Spectre to come right ten degrees and the target will be on his nose.” Kamigami was talking on his MX-360 and having Stansell relay vectors that would guide the gunship to the soldiers they had followed and who were now mortaring the field. “Also, friendlies are two hundred meters north of target on road in a dark pickup truck.”

  “Roger,” Stansell replied after he had relayed the messages to the gunship. “Spectre has target in sight and are aware of your position.”

  Kamigami watched the gunship set up a firing orbit around the cluster of buildings the mortar teams were firing from. “Those muthas are in some kind of trouble, Lieutenant.” Jamison wasn’t sure who the sergeant was talking about, the mortar teams or the gunship. The ZSU-23-4 was hidden not far from them and he had seen what it could do.

  “We go,” Kamigami grunted, and drove slowly past a walled compound. “Now,” he ordered. Jamison sat up in the back of the pickup and raised the sergeant’s M-203, pointed the barrel skyward and fired the grenade launcher, sending a 40mm cartridge over the wall. They were sending indirect fire onto the ZSU-23-4 that had run to earth inside the walls. Jamison reloaded and fired again and again as Kamigami turned down a side street and moved down the other side of the compound. Their plan was to keep the crew of the ZSU-23-4 occupied while the gunship was in range.

  In the distance they could hear the gunship work the mortar teams over, destroying the low buildings where they were hiding, then they heard the distinctive whomp of the 105mm cannon as Beasely leveled his target.

  The attack on the airfield was over.

  Inside the compound the ZSU commander ordered his driver to break out of the compound. The Iranian gunned the engine and smashed through the rear gate. Kamigami’s eyes were drawn into narrow squints as he watched the ZSU-23-4 clank away from him. Only this time there were no supporting troops or trucks following it. The sergeant grunted in satisfaction and followed. He had a score to settle with the ZSU commander, preferably alive. Besides, as he told the lieutenant, the ZSU was a threat to any aircraft taking off from the airfield and they had plenty of time to rejoin…

  *

  Mahidashi, Iran

  “Spectre, Scamp One-Two.” Mallard was calling Beasely, who had joined him orbiting near the highway bridge. “Glad you could make it. Are you in contact with Ratso and what the hell is taking so damn long? We’ve been holding for over ten minutes.”

  “Rog, Scamp. Sorry for the delay. Had to see a man about a mortar. Ratso is up and heading for the bridge now.” The two Hercules continued to orbit, with Beasely stacked above Mallard. Now they could see a small convoy move out of Mahidashi village toward the destroyed bridge. Three trucks, two vans and a small bus were sandwiched between the two jeeps. “Scamp,” Beasely called, “check the highway to the west. I’ve got the lead tanks in sight. Time to do some discouragin’.” Beasely broke out of orbit and started to climb, straining his three remaining engines.

  “Scamp,” Beasely called, “Ratso is in position and says to drop on him.” The jeeps with their commandeered vehicles had pulled up near the bridge. Mallard could see civilians, the former owners or drivers, running back to the village. A Ranger in one of the jeeps popped green smoke, the signal to drop.

  Drunkin Dunkin watched the smoke drift lazily upward. Satisfied that winds would not be a problem, he keyed his intercom. “Three minute warning.”

  In the rear of the C-130 the jumpmaster stood by the left paratroop door. “Get Ready,” he bellowed. “Stand Up!” The forty-five jumpers were on their feet. “Hook Up!” Forty-five hands snapped the hook on their static line to the anchor line above their heads. “Check Static Line!” Forty-five sets of eyes took one last look at their static line and took the slack out of it by forming a bight and clenching it tightly. “Check Equipment!” Each Ranger used his free hand to jerk and tug at his equipment one last time, making sure everything was secure. “Sound Off For Equipment Check!” The last man in each stick tapped the Ranger in front and yelled, “Okay!” The signal was passed until the stick leader got it and yelled, “All Okay!”

  The jumpmaster rooted himself in the door, holding on to the stanchions on each side. “One minute warning,” came over his headset. He stuck his head out and checked the approaching DZ. He could see the green smoke. Dunkin was right on. He stood back and pointed at the door with two fingers. “Stand In The Door!” The Rangers shuffled forward, two lines on each side of the aircraft.

  The red jump light by each door snapped off and the green light flickered to on. “GO!” The Rangers took little hops as they went out the door one second apart. Ten men on each side had gone out when the jump light flicked back to red and Dunkin yelled over the intercom. “Red Light! Red Light! Stop Jump! Stop Jump!”

  The jumpmaster stepped into the door and pushed the next jumper back with both hands. The Hercules rolled into a ninety degree left bank, pulled down and away…and the jumpmaster fell out the door as a smoke trail and tracers passed behind the C-130.

  “What the hell happened?” the loadmaster yelled over the intercom. “The jumpmaster fell out and I got bodies all over the deck…” They were flying straight and level now, less than two hundred feet above the ground.

  “The fuckers hosed us down with a SAM and Triple A,” Dunkin told him. “We were lucky they were too far away…We got the jumpmaster in sight, he’s waving he’s okay.” The Rangers on the ground had a different view. The jumpmaster was coming down in his chute, swearing, and giving the C-130 the finger.

  “Yeah,” the loadmaster shouted, “Well, I’ve got about twenty pissed-off Rangers that want to get on the ground.”

  Mallard turned to his navigator. “Okay, Dunk, if we go in low enough, we can stay under all that crap they threw at us.” Dunkin reached for “the gadget” in his navigation bag.

  *

  Kermanshah, Iran

  “Scamp One-Four destroyed on runway, five crew members KIA,” the RTO was transmitting on the SatCom, giving the Pentagon command center a status report after the mortar attack on the airfield. “Scamp One-Three damaged and out of commission. Aircrew, okay. Scamp One-Five is undamaged and mission capable. Stormy Zero-Two is slightly damaged, status unknown at this time, the WSO, Captain Furry, is wounded. One Ranger KIA, two wounded.”

  “Say status of runway,” the woman’s voice came through the scrambler loud and clear.

  “Runway is closed,” the RTO answered.

  “Say current threat.”

  “Negative threat to airfield at this time. Armored column reported at Mahidashi highway bridge…”

  Gregory turned to Stansell, “We’re in big trouble unless we can get a runway open. And we could
sure use another C-130 to help Scamp One-Two and One-Five get us out of here.”

  Stansell thought a moment. “That hulk will have to turn itself out on the runway before we can push it off.”

  “How we going to do that?”

  “Jeeps and winches. But right now we’re going to see if the crew for Scamp One-Three can get their two good engines started and move about a hundred feet out of the way. We fill in the craters on the dirt strip and we’ve got a runway.”

  “What about the F-15?” Gregory asked.

  “Have to wait and see if Jack can get it started, it took some battle damage from that mortar round that got Furry, and if we can clear the main runway.”

  “We still need another C-130,” Gregory reminded him.

  “Right.” Stansell asked the RTO to let him talk to the command center. “Blue Chip, this is Lifter. We need airlift. Scamp One-One is in orbit with Delray Five-One. Send Scamp One-One our way now. Repeat, send Scamp One-One our way now.”

  The wait for Blue Chip to make a decision seemed forever. Jack Locke walked into the silent room. “Furry’s in pretty bad shape,” he told the colonel. “Shrapnel in the back. Frag also punched two small holes in my jet. Doesn’t look bad but the nitrogen bottle for the jet fuel starter won’t hold a charge. Can’t start engines.”

  The silence grew heavier.

  “Lifter,” the SatCom came alive. “This is Blue Chip. Be advised Scamp One-One is departing orbit at this time.”

  Lydia Kowalski and her crew were finally going to war.

  “Now we got to get that C-130 moved,” Stansell said.

  A voice came over the PRC-77. “Lifter, this is Romeo. We’re ready to load. All POWs released and accounted for but one. Working to free him now.”

  Gregory looked at Stansell, waiting for a decision. “They’d be safer in the prison than here…until we get the field open.”

  “Move them now,” Stansell ordered. “Jack, get out to the dirt strip and get it opened. We load the POWs on Scamp One-Five. It launches the minute we get a runway.”

  *

  Mahidashi, Iran

  “Captain, this is all you’re gonna get,” Beasely’s flight engineer told him. The AC-130 had managed to climb to eleven thousand feet on its three engines and it wasn’t going any higher. Beasely wanted more altitude to increase his stand-off distance from the tanks approaching the bridge. Because the terrain elevation was 4,000 feet, he was only 7,000 above the ground. That meant a thirty-degree bank in his firing orbit would give them a stand-off distance of 12,000 feet—enough to stay clear of the ZSU-23-4 that was moving with the tanks, but it also put them inside the range of the two SA-8s Jack had seen.

  Beasely told his electronic warfare officer and the illuminator operator to stay alert for SA-8s and entered a firing orbit to engage the lead tank that was almost at the bridge.

  Mado wanted to order this AC-130 to stand clear but sensed that it would develop into a contest of wills and he wasn’t sure who would win—him, or Beasely and Thunder. So instead he continued to relay information to the Pentagon over the SatCom.

  “Flaps aren’t coming down evenly,” Beasely said. “Scanner, check the flaps on the right side.”

  A sergeant from the rear reported back. “Center section looks like its hanging up because of battle damage. The flap-drive motor is screaming its head off.” He was talking about the hydraulic-driven flap-drive motor nestled between the wings in the overhead above the cargo deck. Beasely eased the flaps back up and raised the nose with the yoke, playing the trim for all it was worth. When he was satisfied with the orbit, he sighted on the lead tank and sent a 105mm round on its way, the AC-130 shuddering as it absorbed the 105’s recoil.

  “Direct hit!” the sensor operator in the rear called out. Then silence. “Beezer, that didn’t stop it. He’s still moving.”

  “We do it again,” Beasely said. He could see the muzzle of the tank point at him as he sent three rounds toward the tank, until he blew a tread off. Then he turned to the second tank and fired.

  “SAM lock on!” the EWO yelled over the intercom.

  “Break right!” from the IO. Hanging out the rear of the aircraft, the illuminator operator could see two smoke trails coming at them. Again, he sent a stream of chaff and flares behind them. Beastly rolled into a 110-degree bank and pushed the nose down while turning to the right, pulling two Gs. As he did, a loader feeding the 105mm was thrown across .the aircraft into the ammo rack and knocked unconscious. The first missile streaked harmlessly overhead, but the second passed close enough that its proximity fuse activated, and the missile’s fireball sent a burst of metal fragments into the right side of the fuselage.

  Again, the AC-130 retreated, trailing smoke from the right main gear well…

  *

  While the gunship was engaging the tanks, Mallard ran in for the second drop. Drunkin Dunkin was holding onto the back of the copilot’s seat, sighting the depression angle through the “gadget.” He was going to give the green light exactly six hundred feet short of where he wanted the first Ranger to land, which meant a depression angle of sixty degrees. “I need a hard altitude of three hundred and fifty feet, Duck.” Mallard checked his radar altimeter and squeaked it lower. The smoke trail of an SA-8 passed over them.

  “What happens if they have a chute malfunction?” Don Larson, the copilot said.

  “They won’t have time to think about it,” Dunkin said. “Ready, ready…” He sighted the depression angle, waiting to hit sixty degrees…

  Actually, Dunkin was good enough to have eyeballed it, but this way he was deadly accurate. “Green Light!” The Rangers streamed out the back, their chutes popping open at the end of the twenty-foot static lines. Most were on the ground before they had made one swing, then were running for their rally point…

  *

  Kermanshah, Iran

  The two Rangers were pushing against the wood brace, trying to lever it into place and shore up the ceiling. “Hernia time,” one grunted as they tried again. This time they wedged it next to the cell door. “Might be able to blow the door now,” the Ranger said. “That beam should take the weight.” Mary and Carroll looked apprehensively at the ceiling above them.

  Mary put her ear to the cell door. “Doc, can you hear me?”

  No reply.

  Another Ranger called down into the basement. “Captain Trimler says it’s time to go. We got all the POWs loaded we’re moving out—”

  “I don’t go without doc,” Mary said.

  Carroll decided it. “Tell Trimler to leave us a truck. We’ll stay here with Mustapha. Tell the road team holding the intersection—”

  “That’s Objective Red,” the Ranger told him.

  “—Objective Red,” Carroll continued, “that we’re here and to pick us up when they withdraw. We’ll stay in contact over the MX-360.”

  “We’ll stay,” the Ranger standing next to Mary said. The other Ranger nodded agreement.

  *

  The Pentagon

  “Sir, the President wants to see you.” It was Cunningham’s aide, Stevens. He pointed to the Command and Authority Room. Cunningham grunted and pushed his chair back. When he stood up he could see Admiral Scovill, Leachmeyer and Camm from the CIA in the room. He had been expecting this.

  The President was leaning back in his chair, pointing an unlit cigar at Burke, the CIA Director, when Cunningham entered the room. “The DIA tells me that a partisan force of Kurds attacked the main airport at Kermanshah in conjunction with our raid. Further, that they destroyed an airliner on the field that was waiting to move the POWs. Now what the hell is going on?”

  Burke was fighting for his job and knew it. “I wish I knew the DIA’s sources so I could confirm that information—”

  “They’re talking to the Mossad,” the President said, his voice tight. “Our allies—damn good ones too when it comes to intelligence. Don’t you talk to them?”

  “Of course, we do…”

  Allan Camm stepped
in. “Excuse me, sir, but we carefully evaluate everything we get from the Israelis. We have found that the quality of their intelligence has degraded in the last few years…”

  “Well, there’s nothing wrong with the quality now.” The President swung back onto Burke. “Bobby, you’re a pro…I need better intelligence.” He pointed at the situation boards with his cigar. “Now how do we get the rest of our people out of there?”

  “Mr. President, it’s still salvageable,” Cunningham said. All eyes in the room were on him. “First, two-thirds of the POWs are out of Iran and should be landing at Incirlik within thirty minutes. Second, the last third are moving to the airfield right now and we’ve got a C-130 waiting for them.”

  “And no runway,” Leachmeyer jabbed.

  “They will have shortly, Charlie. You underestimate what a C-130 can do and how motivated those people are.”

  “That still leaves my Rangers trapped.”

  So now they’re “yours,” Cunningham thought. “We’ve got two C-130s airborne that can land, and if the Rangers can disengage from that armored column we’ll get ’em out.”

  The door opened and Andy Wollard, the President’s chief of staff, came in. “Sir, latest transmission from General Mado: the Rangers are holding at the bridge and his aircraft has taken another hit engaging a tank. But he’s going to stay airborne. Also, all of the POWs but two are at the airfield.”

  “Mado’s a goddamn hero,” Leachmeyer said.

  Not if I have anything to say about it, Cunningham thought. He damn well should have been on the ground at the first opportunity…

  The President dismissed them and huddled with his National Security Advisor.

  Outside, Burke drew Camm aside and grabbed his right elbow. “We had better be clean on this…”