by Ricky Sides
Appeased by the man’s use of the term your majesty, Tom decided to drop the matter but made a mental note to have a squad of men with the shoulder fired stinger missiles in reserve to fire at any of the pilots who refused to follow his instructions to the letter.
***
Namid stared out the windshield of her cockpit at the three flight wings as they flew at four hundred miles per hour toward Kansas. She thought that the plan was a good plan and just might work. The Texas wing of fighters would go in first and bomb as much of the facilities as they could. The fighters of Base 1 would follow behind the Texas fighters at a fifteen-minute interval. If the Texans had their hands full dog fighting the enemy, then the Base 1 flight would lend a hand. The California flight wing, with the largest flight, would follow five minutes behind the Base 1 flight and proceed on their bombing run hoping to catch large numbers of the enemy out trying to survey the damage or fight fires. Since all of the California based aircraft had been summoned for retrofitting, it was decided that they would all participate in the raid despite the lack of lasers in the flight trainers. The extra seven pilots needed for that mission came from the pool of trainees who had finished at the bottom of their class.
As Namid watched the flight wings approaching the Kansas state line, she saw the Texans throttle up and pull ahead of the other two flight wings. The Base 1 and California flight wings began a wide circling maneuver. They’d fly in circles until time for their respective flight wings to begin their run to Salina.
The Texans penetrated Kansas airspace fully expecting to meet the attack helicopters at any moment, but it wasn’t until they were within ten miles of the Salina airport that they encountered the flight of twenty attack helicopters. The helicopters were flying at a flight level of one thousand feet. They opened fire on the twenty-one peacekeeper fighters immediately and to their utter disgust, the Texans soon learned that they could not target the enemy. They were simply too high. Neither the lasers nor the miniguns were capable of targeting them from that angle. The flight leader, seeing this problem, opted to ignore the choppers and continue on their bombing run. So far, his flight had survived the combined firepower of the helicopters but it was just a matter of time before they began launching heavier weaponry attacks on the lightly armored fighters.
The helicopters soon fell behind as the flight raced at five-hundred miles per hour for the airport. In moments, the peacekeeper fighters arrived and began to select targets of opportunity. They bombed the runways and turned about to begin another attack run at the facilities. This time as they approached they targeted the light machinegun emplacements, which were firing furiously at the attacking fighters. The Texans dropped their second set of bombs and most of those took out the light machinegun anti aircraft defenses. The peacekeepers were lucky that the machinegun emplacements were not armed with the heavier machinegun calibers such as the fifty-calibers. Had that been the case the outcome would have been radically different.
They were turning about for their third attack run when the attack helicopters arrived on the scene. They fired their miniguns at the fighters to no affect and then they launched a salvo of missiles at the rear of the fighters even as the fighters dropped their third and final round of bombs on the building where many of the enemy seemed to be running for shelter. The missiles slammed into the fighters with enough force to cause them to shudder violently, but they did not detonate nor had they penetrated the skin of the aircraft. The missiles rebounded off the fighters and flew about in seemingly random directions. Seeing this, several of the attack helicopters instinctively tried to climb above them rather than collide with the errant missiles. The heat from their engines triggered the infrared tracking systems on several of the missiles that then began to pursue the attack helicopters. Within moments, their own missiles had destroyed two of the attack helicopters when they climbed in an effort to escape and thus permitted the missiles to reach them above their minimal detonation altitude.
The Texas peacekeeper flight leader ordered the flight to turn and attack the helicopters while they were low enough to engage. In the first minute of that battle, three more helicopters were destroyed but then the rest of the flight went for altitude. The flight leader ordered the flight to proceed to the border. He radioed the Base 1 flight leader that he was leading the attack helicopters away to the west so that the Alabama squadron could drop their ordinance unhindered if possible. He advised the flight leader about several sites remaining at the airport and in the surrounding area, which appeared to have elaborate defenses constructed, and recommended the man use a few bombs on them.
As the Texans flew west for the border, the attack helicopters strafed them for as long as they were close enough to do so. However, attacking from the rear, they could not penetrate the comparatively weaker canopies of the fighters. On a hunch, the flight leader ordered his flight to continue west while he came about and tried to target the attack helicopters from a distance sufficient for the lasers to be able to target the choppers. He soon learned that this approach wouldn’t work. By the time that he was close enough for the targeting system to attempt to lock on the target; the angle was already too steep. Turning back to the west the flight leader opened the throttle to full and soon pulled away from the slower helicopters. He advised the Base 1 flight leader of the maneuver that he had attempted and the negative results. He summed it up by saying, “We are faster and have better armor. We can outfight them easily, but only if they come down to our flight level.” The Texan had just discovered their Achilles heel.
Listening in at Base 1, Pete turned immediately to Pol and asked if he had any suggestions. “Yes I do my friend,” Pol replied. “Get missiles and mount them on the fighters. Something that can reach the angle needed. There is no way to redesign the lasers or miniguns to hit that angle and still be able to be effective on ground targets. And ground targets will be much more numerous than other aircraft.”
***
The Alabama based fighters began their attack run. Flight leader Jeff Brown saw immediately what his Texas counterpart had been referring to in his advice to attack the fortified positions. There were concrete walls set up near many of the buildings. He even saw some around a Traveler’s Inn hotel located within a mile of the airport. He was contemplating that sight when he felt bullets slamming into his fighter. Taking evasive action, he searched the sky for the source of the attack and soon he saw one of the predators launch a missile at him. He ignored the missile hoping that it would fail to detonate and instead raced straight toward the drone. Three shots with his laser took that bird out of the sky in a blazing fireball. He felt the missile slam into the side of his fuselage as he executed a turn to try to locate his flight wing to rejoin them. However, below him on the ground he saw several men with missiles on their shoulders aiming at his flight. He turned full on the men and opened fire with his minigun. He heard a loud burping sound as the minigun fired for three seconds and the ground all around the enemy erupted into puffs. The men fell and lay still. But as one of the men fell, his missile fired and flew through the window of one of the fortified buildings. The men inside, fearing the missile would detonate scrambled to get out of the building. Two of the peacekeepers, seeing that target of opportunity, opened fire with their miniguns.
As the fighting raged, three more drones arrived, but this time they stuck to their higher altitudes and launched Hellfire missiles at the fighters. Those missiles closed the gap at an incredible rate of speed. The pilots desperately fired their lasers and miniguns in an effort to shoot the missiles and three of the six were hit and destroyed before they could reach the fighters. However, three got through that defensive firing and struck three of the fighters, blowing them out of the sky. Some of the men on the ground cheered as the three fighters exploded but the three predators that launched the missiles were destroyed when the peacekeeper pilots attacked the predator ground control systems and destroyed them, thus cutting off the controls for the drones and causing them to cras
h.
Then the larger Californian flight arrived and they began dropping their ordinance. In the cockpit of her fighter, Namid filmed everything that had even a remotely fortified appearance. She also filmed the damage thus far inflicted and she was surprised at just how effective the inexperienced pilots had been. As she was flying past one of the fortified buildings a machinegun nest opened fire, strafing the fuselage of her fighter. She executed an evasive maneuver and then turned her aircraft for an attack run on that building. Her bomb landed between the machinegun nest and the building. The machinegun nest and a good section of the building disappeared in the explosion.
Namid was turning to resume her reconnaissance mission when the word was given by the flight leaders to fly west to the border. They were hoping to catch the surviving helicopters between their force and the Texans who would turn to engage the enemy when they reached the border.
Namid dropped her last two bombs on two different fortified buildings and then throttled up to catch the fighter flight wings that were disappearing in the distance. She strafed several vehicles that were attempting to flee the airport with loads of men in the rear of the trucks. The men fired back but her minigun made short work of them as she zipped past their position.
Namid heard the chatter on the radio as the Texans began to engage the attack helicopters once more. The men and women of the Texas flight wing were frustrated by their inability to target the enemy. They were attempting every maneuver possible, but nothing they did would cause the nose of their fighter to pitch high enough to bring the attacking enemy into targeting position. Then Namid remembered a maneuver that had gotten two pilots in a world of trouble back in flight school. She contacted the Base 1 flight leader Jeff Brown with a suggestion that was just wild enough that it might work. That flight leader considered the matter carefully and then he contacted the California flight leader and they discussed the maneuver. The Californian laughed and said, “I remember that stunt. Both of the men drew punishment and had to wash dishes for a week, but yeah, it might work,” he said.
The two flights stopped and hovered at three hundred feet. The forty-six fighters paired up with twenty-three lining up directly behind their partners. The maneuver called for the rear fighters to put the front few feet of their fighters on the rear of their partner’s fighter and then decrease their altitude slightly. This caused the nose of both fighters to elevate a few degrees. It was incredibly difficult to maintain that position. All along the line, fighters would hold the position until the nose slipped off the sleek rear of their partner’s fighter and then they had to reposition their planes.
“Namid, this was your idea, so please advise the Texas flight leader to bring the pigeons to us. We’re ready for the pigeon shoot,” Jeff Brown said laughing. Then he cursed as the nose of his fighter slipped off the rear of his wingman’s plane and he had to perform the maneuver again.
In the Peacekeeper, Pete asked Pol, “Can that work?”
“It can yes, but it is insanely dangerous,” Pol said.
“So is fighting attack helicopters that they can’t target at all,” Jim responded.
“They need this victory after losing three fighters in Salina,” Tim agreed.
Namid passed along the instructions to the Texas flight leader giving him the flight course they should take on their approach and advising him to bring his flight down to two hundred feet and slow their airspeed to three hundred miles per hour. “The choppers need to be preoccupied with your flight as they come into attack vector,” she explained.
The minutes passed slowly for the California and Base 1 flight wings who realized that they were sitting ducks for even the slow moving enemy drones. During the waiting, the pilots got better at maintaining position. When the Texas flight wing came hurtling toward their waiting formation of paired fighters, the pilots were ready. “I’ve got weapons lock!” Jim heard an excited pilot shout over the radio and then he heard the sound of a laser firing. “Splash one pigeon!” the pilot shouted joyfully and Jim smiled.
The ragged line of fighters managed to hold position for the first minute of the battle and then several begin to slip backwards. The pilots were moving about inside the fighters so much that they couldn’t maintain position. Even their movements proved to be enough to cause their planes to slip and slide. One pilot almost shot the fighter in front of him as his aircraft slid backwards off his partner’s plane. The flight leaders ordered the rear formation of pilots to cease firing and leave it to the front ranks
It wasn’t pretty and it certainly wasn’t efficient, but the maneuver made it possible for the peacekeepers to shoot down an additional five attack helicopters before the remainder of the flight turned tail and ran.
“Shall we pursue them?” one pilot asked.
In the Peacekeeper, Patricia looked to the council to see if they wished to give orders regarding the question but Jim said, “Why don’t we let the flight leaders make the call. We have to let them run their missions with minimal interference on our part.”
The other two council members nodded, and Pete said, “I’d say they earned the right to make the call. What an ingenious plan they conceived and executed.”
Tim smiled and said, “They seem to have worked out a short term solution for themselves, but we need to address this issue. I doubt that trick would work a second time.”
The Texas flight leader spoke up saying, “I think it’s time we took them to the barn boys and girls.”
The Base 1 flight leader said, “I agree. I want to see what Pol can come up with for us. This trick can’t work often. They’ll counter it next time, and I for one don’t like my people being sitting ducks.”
“Agreed,” responded the California flight leader, and then he added, “Alabama, you take the lead. With your permission we’ll honor your lost pilots with a missing man formation of our own.”
“Thank you California,” responded Jeff with sadness. “They would be pleased by the show of respect.”
The flight leaders set a course for Texas and all three flights flew in the missing man formation to honor their dead.
Chapter 28
The room was crowded with the people who needed to view the video footage of the reconnaissance of the Salina airport and the surrounding area. The peacekeeper council members were all present as were Namid, Jeff Brown, Pol, and his assistants. Also present were Lieutenant Wilcox, Bill Young, the armorer, and his assistants.
They had watched all of the footage several times taking notes on specific items that they wished to discuss. After the third viewing, they compared notes and all had noted that the Traveler’s Inn seemed to be at the center of activity away from the airport. The fortified positions also indicated that there was something of great value to the enemy in that location for it was the most heavily fortified structure in the area. Getting near it in ground vehicles would be next to impossible without being challenged at any of a dozen checkpoints. They all agreed that this target should receive special attention but they didn’t know exactly what to do about the hotel, which could very well contain innocent people.
Lieutenant Wilcox thought that his strike force team might be able to penetrate the facility provided that there were sufficient diversions taking place to draw away some of the guards and provide a distraction for the occupants of the building. Pol thought that some of the small drones would be ideal for utilization in neutralizing the perimeter security.
They discussed several other targets that they felt certain contained portions of the army that Tom had assembled. Of course, nothing was certain, but they thought that they had located the fuel depot, the armory, and several barracks used by the enemy. They had enough information to plan the next battle in precise detail.
Next, they discussed the problem that the fighters had encountered and Jim opened the floor for suggestions of possible solutions. All eyes turned to Pol and his assistants at that point. Pol explained that the weapons were already committed to their current design and
that any modifications made to them to render them capable of targeting enemy aircraft at higher altitudes would render them useless against ground targets. Pol reminded them all that the fighters could not dive in the traditional sense. Even when descending the fighters maintained a trim profile as did the Peacekeeper. He suggested that missiles be located to add to the fighters.
Namid pointed out that there was no real reason that all of the fighters have identical configuration and she suggested modifying a small number of fighters from each base to deal with the air-to-air threats. They’d still have bombing capability to utilize for ground attacks.
The armorer said that making the alterations to the miniguns would take approximately four hours each because the entire weapon assembly would have to be taken off the aircraft and replacement brackets installed to change the targeting vectors, and then the weapon system would have to be reinstalled calibrated, and tested. He pointed out that the lasers were not his expertise but he could alter the miniguns on six aircraft in two days. They already had the other brackets.
Pol said that he could alter the lasers in a short period, but recalibrating the targeting computers and testing the units would take several hours.
The council discussed the issues privately while everyone took a short break. When the meeting resumed Jim was acting as representative for the council when he said, “We’ve reached a decision. None of us is happy about the workload that we’ll be placing on you folks, but during this emergency, we think it is the wisest course of action. We think it best to give each fighter wing six fighters configured for air-to-air combat. We have already ordered Patricia to contact the other two bases to send six candidates for the alterations as soon as possible.”