by Tom Clancy
The group’s forty-eight Tomcat interceptors were now mostly on station, spread in a line three hundred miles across. Each pair of Tomcats had a tanker aircraft in attendance. The attack birds, Corsairs and Intruders, carried oversized fuel tanks with refueling drogues attached, and one by one the Tomcats were already beginning to top off their fuel tanks from them. Soon the Corsairs began returning to their carriers for refills. They could keep this up for hours. The aircraft remaining on the carriers were spotted on the decks for immediate takeoff. If a raid came in, they would be shot off the catapults at once to eliminate the fire hazard inherent in any type of aircraft.
Toland had seen all this before, but could not fail to be amazed by it. Everything was going as smoothly as a ballet. The aircraft loitered at their patrol stations, tracing lazy, fuel-efficient circles in the sky. The carriers were racing east now at thirty knots to make up the distance lost during launch operations. The Marines’ landing ships Saipan, Ponce, and Newport could make only about twenty knots, and were essentially defenseless. East of the group, carrier S-3A Viking and land-based P-3C Orion antisubmarine aircraft were patrolling for Soviet submarines. They reported to the group ASW commander on the destroyer Caron. There was as yet nothing for anyone to direct his frustration against. The old story known to all fighting men. You wait.
NORTH ATLANTIC
The raid commander was rapidly accumulating data. He now had positions on four American Hawkeyes. The first two had barely been plotted when the second pair had showed up, outside and south of the first. The Americans had unwittingly given him a very accurate picture of where the battle group was, and the steady eastward drift of the Hawkeyes gave him course and speed. His Bears were now in a wide semicircle around the Americans, and the Badgers were thirty minutes north of American radar cover, four hundred miles north of the estimated location of the ships.
“Send to Group A: ‘Enemy formation at grid coordinates 456/810, speed twenty, course one-zero-zero. Execute Attack Plan A at 0615 Zulu time.’ Send the same to Group B. Tactical control of Group B switches to Team East Coordinator.” The battle had begun.
The Badger crews exchanged looks of relief. They had detected the American radar signals fifteen minutes before, and knew that each kilometer south meant a greater chance that they would run into a cloud of enemy fighters. Aboard each aircraft the navigator and bombardier worked quickly to feed strike information into the Kelt missiles slung under each wing.
Eight hundred miles to their southwest, the Backfire crews advanced their throttles slightly, plotting a course to the datum point supplied by the raid commander. Having circled far around the American formation, they would now be controlled by the strike officer aboard the first Bear to make electronic contact with the Hawkeyes. They had a solid fix on the NATO formation, but they needed better if they were to locate and engage the carriers. These crews were not relieved, but excited. Now came the challenging part. The battle plan had been formulated a year before and practiced—over land exclusively—five times. Four times it had worked.
Aboard eighty Badger bombers, pilots checked their watches, counting off the seconds to 0615 Zulu.
“Launch!”
The lead Badger launched eight seconds early. First one, then the second, aircraft-shaped Kelt dropped free of its pylon, falling several hundred feet before their turbojet engines ran up to full power. Running on autopilot, the Kelts climbed back to thirty thousand feet and cruised on south at six hundred knots indicated air speed. The bomber crews watched their birds proceed for a minute or two, then each of the bombers turned slowly and gracefully for home, their mission done. Six Badger-J stand-off jamming aircraft continued south. They would stay sixty kilometers behind the Kelts. Their crews were nervous but confident. It would not be easy for American radar to burn through their powerful jammers, and in any case, the Americans would soon have many targets to concern them.
The Kelts continued on, straight and level. They carried their own electronic equipment, which would be triggered automatically by sensors in their tail fins. When they entered the theoretical arc of the Hawkeyes’ radar range, transponders in their noses clicked on.
USS NIMITZ
“Radar contacts! Designate Raid-1, bearing three-four-niner, range four-six-zero miles. Numerous contacts, count one-four-zero contacts, course one-seven-five, speed six hundred knots.”
The master tactical scope plotted the contacts electronically, and a pair of plexiglass plates showed another visual display.
“So, here they come,” Baker said quietly. “Right on time. Comments?”
“I—” Toland didn’t get a chance.
The computer display went white.
“Clipper Base, this is Hawk-Three. We’re getting some jamming,” reported the senior airborne control officer. “We plot six, possibly seven jammers, bearing three-four-zero to zero-three-zero. Pretty powerful stuff. Estimate we have stand-off jammers, but no escort jammers. Contacts are lost for the present. Estimate burn-through in ten minutes. Request weapons free, and release to vector intercepts.”
Baker looked over to his air operations officer. “Let’s get things started.”
Air/Ops nodded and picked up a microphone. “Hawk-Three, this is Clipper Base. Weapons free. I say again, weapons are free. Release authority is granted. Splash me some bombers. Out.”
Svenson frowned at the display. “Admiral, we’re coming about to clear decks. Recommend the formation stays together now.” He got a nod. “Clipper Fleet, this is Clipper Base, come left to two-seven-zero. Launch all remaining aircraft. Execute.”
On the single command, the formation made a hundred-eighty-degree left turn. Those ships that did not as yet have missiles on their launchers rectified this. Fire-control radars were trained north, but kept in standby mode. Thirty different captains waited for the word to activate.
NORTH ATLANTIC
She was pissed off. Sure, she thought, I’m good enough to fly. I’m good enough to be an instructor pilot for the Eagle. Engineering test pilot, assistant project officer for the ASAT program—I’m good enough to get an invite to Houston, even—but will they let me fly combat? No, there’s a war going on and I’m nothing but a Goddamned ferry pilot!
“Shit.” Her name was Amy Nakamura. She was a major, United States Air Force, with three thousand hours of jet time, two-thirds of it in F-15s. Short and stocky like many fighter pilots, only her father had ever called her beautiful. He also called her Bunny. When her fellow pilots found that one out, they shortened it to Buns. She and three men were ferrying four brand-new Eagle fighters to Germany where others—men!—would get to use them properly. They each carried fast-pack conformal fuel tanks to make the trip in one long hop, and for self-defense a single Sidewinder missile, plus their usual load of 20mm cannon shells. The Russians let women fly combat in World War II! she thought. A couple even made ace!
“Hey, Buns, check your three o’clock!” called her wingman.
Nakamura had phenomenal eyesight, but she could scarcely believe it. “Tell me what you see, Butch.”
“Badgers . . . ?”
“Fuckin’ Tu-16 Badgers—taldyho! Where’s the Navy supposed to be?”
“Close. Try and raise ’em, Buns!”
“Navy task force, Navy task force, this is Air Force ferry flight Golf-Four-Niner. We are eastbound with four Foxtrot-One-Fives. We have a visual on a Russian bomber formation position—shit, do you read, over?”
“Who the hell is that?” a Hawkeye crewman asked aloud.
The communications technician answered, “Golf-Four-Niner, we need authentication. November Four Whiskey.” This could be a Russian playing radio games.
Major Nakamura swore to herself as she ran her finger down the list of communication codes. There! “Alpha Six Hotel.”
“Golf-Four-Niner, this is Navy Hawk-One, say your position. Warning, we are calling in the clans on those Badgers. You’d better get clear, acknowledge.”
“Like hell, Navy, I got
visual on three-plus Badgers northbound, position forty-nine north, thirty-three east.”
“Northbound?” the intercept officer said. “Golf, this is Hawk-One. Confirm your visual. Say again your visual.”
“Hawk-One, this is Golf, I now have a dozen Badger, say again Tango-Uniform-One-Six bombers visual, south of my position, heading toward me and closing fast. We are engaging. Out.”
“Nothing on radar, boss,” the radar operator said. “That’s way the hell north of here.”
“Then what the hell is he talking about?”
Major Amelia “Buns” Nakamura reached down without looking to toggle up her missile and head-up display to tactical. Then she flipped the switch for her air-intercept radar. Her IFF system interrogated the target as a possible friendly and came up blank. That was enough.
“Frank, take your element east. Butch, follow me. Everybody watch your fuel states. Charge!”
The Badger pilots were a little too relaxed, now that the most dangerous part of their mission was behind them. They didn’t spot the four American fighters until they were less than a mile away, their robin’s-egg-blue paint blending them in perfectly with the clear morning sky.
Buns selected her cannon for the first pass and triggered two hundred rounds into the cockpit of a Badger. The twin-engine bomber went instantly out of control and rolled over like a dead whale. One. The major howled with delight, pulled the Eagle up into a five-g loop, then over to dive on the next target. The Soviets were alerted now, and the second Badger attempted to dive away. It had not the slightest chance. Nakamura fired her Sidewinder from a range of less than a mile and watched the missile trace all the way into the Badger’s left-side engine, and blast the wing right off the airplane. Two. Another Badger was three miles ahead. Patience, she told herself. You have a big speed advantage. She nearly forgot that the Russian bomber had tail guns. A Soviet sergeant reminded her of it, missing, but scaring the hell out of her. The Eagle jerked in a six-g turn to the left and closed on a parallel course before turning in. The next burst from her cannon exploded the Badger in midair, and she had to dive to avoid the wreckage. The engagement lasted all of ninety seconds, and she was wringing wet with perspiration.
“Butch, where are you?”
“I got one! Buns, I got one!” The Eagle pulled up alongside.
Nakamura looked around. Suddenly the sky was clear. Where had they all gone?
“Navy Hawk-One, this is Golf, do you read, over?”
“Roger, Golf.”
“Okay, Navy. We just smoked four, repeat four, Badgers for you.”
“Make that five, Buns!” the other element leader called in.
“Something’s wrong, sir.” The radar operator on Hawk-One motioned to his scope. “We have these buggers just popped through, and they say they bagged some, gotta be three, four hundred miles away.”
“Clipper Base, this is Hawk-One, we just had contact with an Air Force ferry flight eastbound. They claim they just splashed five Badgers northbound several hundred miles north of us. Say again northbound.”
Toland’s eyebrows went up.
“Probably some had to abort,” Baker observed. “This is close to their fuel limit, isn’t it?”
“Yes, sir,” replied Air/Ops. He didn’t look happy with his own answer.
“Burn-through,” announced the radar operator. “We have reacquired the targets.”
The Kelts had flown on, oblivious to the furor around them. Their radar transponders made them look like hundred-ten-foot Badgers. Their own white-noise jammers came on, somewhat obscuring them yet again on the radar scopes, and autopilot controls began to jerk them up, down, left, right, in hundred-meter leaps as an aircraft might do when trying to avoid a missile. The Kelts had been real missiles once, but on retirement from front-line service six years earlier, their warheads had been replaced with additional fuel tankage, and they had been relegated to a role as target drones, a purpose they were serving admirably now.
“Tallyho!” The first squadron of twelve Tomcats was now a hundred fifty miles away. The Kelts showed up perfectly on radar, and the intercept officers in the back seat of each fighter quickly established target tracks. The Kelts were approaching what would have been nominal missile-launch distance—if they were the bombers everyone thought they were.
The Tomcats launched a volley of million-dollar AIM-54C Phoenix missiles at a range of a hundred forty miles. The missiles blazed in on their targets at Mach-5, directed by the fighters’ targeting radars. In under a minute the forty-eight missiles had killed thirty-nine targets. The first squadron broke clear as the second came into launch position.
USS NIMITZ
“Admiral, something is wrong here,” Toland said quietly.
“What might that be?” Baker liked the way things were going. Enemy bomber tracks were being wiped off his screen just as the war games had predicted they would.
“The Russians are coming in dumb, sir.”
“So?”
“So this far the Soviets have not been very dumb! Admiral, why aren’t the Backfires going supersonic? Why one attack group? Why one direction?”
“Fuel constraints,” Baker answered. “The Badgers are at the limit of their fuel, they have to come in direct.”
“But not the Backfires!”
“The course is right, the raid count is right.” Baker shook his head and concentrated on the tactical plot.
The second squadron of fighters had just launched. Unable to get a head-on shot, their missile accuracy suffered somewhat. They killed thirty-four targets with forty-eight missiles. There had been a hundred fifty-seven targets plotted.
The third and fourth Tomcat squadrons arrived together and launched as a group. When their Phoenixes had been fully expended, nineteen targets were left. The two fighter squadrons moved in to engage the remaining targets with their cannon.
“Clipper Base, this is SAM Boss. We’re going to have some leakers. Recommend we start lighting up SAM radars.”
“Roger, SAM Boss. Permission granted,” answered the group tactical warfare coordinator.
NORTH ATLANTIC
“I have air-search radars, bearing zero-three-seven,” the Bear ESM officer noted. “They have detected us. Recommend we illuminate also.” The Bear lit off its Big Bulge look-down radar.
USS NIMITZ
“New radar contact. Designate Raid-2—”
“What?” snapped Baker. Next came a call from the fighters.
“Clipper Base, this is Slugger Lead. I have a visual on my target.” The squadron commander was trying to examine the target on his long-range TV camera. When he spoke, the anguish in his voice was manifest. “Warning, warning, this is not a Badger. We’ve been shooting at Kelt missiles!”
“Raid-2 is seventy-three aircraft, bearing two-one-seven, range one-three-zero miles. We have a Big Bulge radar tracking the formation,” said the CIC talker.
Toland cringed as the new contacts were plotted. “Admiral, we’ve been had.”
The group tactical warfare officer was pale as he toggled his microphone. “Air Warning Red. Weapons free! Threat axis is two-one-seven. All ships turn as necessary to unmask batteries.”
The Tomcats had all been drawn off, leaving the formation practically naked. The only armed fighters over the formation were Foch’s eight Crusaders, long since retired from the American inventory. On a terse command from their carrier, they went to afterburner and rocketed southwest toward the Backfires. Too late.
The Bear already had a clear picture of the American formations. The Russians could not determine ship type, but they could tell large from small, and identify the missile cruiser Ticonderoga by her distinctive radar emissions. The carriers would be close to her. The Bear relayed the information to her consorts. A minute later, the seventy Backfire bombers launched their hundred forty AS-6 Kingfish missiles and turned north at full military power. The Kingfish was nothing like the Kelt. Powered by a liquid-fuel rocket engine, it accelerated to nine hundred
knots and began its descent, its radar-homing head tracking on a pre-programmed target area ten miles wide. Every ship in the center of the formation had several missiles assigned.
“Vampire, Vampire!” the CIC talker said aboard Ticonderoga. “We have numerous incoming missiles. Weapons free.”
The group antiair warfare officer ordered the cruiser’s Aegis weapons system into full automatic mode. Tico had been built with this exact situation in mind. Her powerful radar/computer system immediately identified the incoming missiles as hostile and assigned each a priority of destruction. The computer was completely on its own, free to fire on its electronic will at anything diagnosed as a threat. Numbers, symbols, and vectors paraded across the master tactical display. The fore and aft twin missile launchers trained out at the first targets and awaited the orders to fire. Aegis was state-of-the-art, the best SAM system yet devised, but it had one major weakness: Tico carried only ninety-six SM2 surface-to-air missiles; there were one hundred forty incoming Kingfish. The computer had not been programmed to think about that.
Aboard Nimitz, Toland could feel the carrier heeling into a radical turn, her engines advanced to flank speed, driving the massive warship at over thirty-five knots. Her nuclear-powered escorts, Virginia and California, were also tracking the Kingfish, their own missiles trained out on their launchers.
The Kingtish were at eight thousand feet, one hundred miles out, covering a mile every four seconds. Each had now selected a target, choosing the largest within their fields of view. Nimitz was the nearest large ship, with her missile-ship escorts to her north.