“Angel One copies,” a voice responded over the speaker. The heavy thup-thup-thup of helicopter rotors could be heard in the background.
“On our way. Do you have reports of chutes?”
“Negative chutes, Angel One. No witnesses.”
“Roger, Jefferson. We’ll let you know.”
Tombstone looked at the PLAT camera. Several sailors were still lying on the forward deck where they’d been knocked down by the impact. Black smoke was wafting across the deck between the camera and Jefferson’s bows. A pair of VF97 Tomcats still sat on the catapult slots, steam boiling around them from the deck.
With a fascinated horror, Tombstone watched as the F14 on Cat Two began to move, to slide forward toward the bow.
He couldn’t tell if a cat shooter had accidentally pressed the button, or whether a malfunction had triggered the catapult without a signal from the deck. Whatever the cause, the F14 was moving forward, but slow … slow … far too slowly to get airborne.
“Negative launch! Negative launch!” the Air Boss’s voice sounded over the speaker. Another voice in the background was screaming, “Eject!
Eject! Eject!”
The Tomcat reached the forward edge of the deck like a canoe reaching the precipice of a waterfall. There was a flash and a swirl of smoke.
Two figures could be seen jetting into the sky on rocket trails as the Tomcat balanced precariously for a moment, then swung tail-high and vanished over the bow.
Two parachutes broke in the sky above the flight deck, drifting back toward the ship. One man dropped safely onto the deck a few feet from where he’d launched seconds before. The other drifted aft, landing among the A6 strike aircraft being readied for Operation Mongoose along the carrier’s port side. Deck crewmen rushed up to him as he struggled with his harness, collapsing his chute before it could drag him over the side.
Tombstone turned away from the PLAT monitor in time to see a sailor marking new information onto the transparent acrylic flight status board. He’d not caught the number of the F14 that had been shot down.
Tomcat 201, Army and Dixie. The sailor was writing “MIA: 0801” in bold letters across the row reserved for them. His Tomcat … and his place.
I should have been there … He dismissed the thought immediately. The fates that determined each twist of life and death in combat were too capricious to be analyzed in so simplistic a fashion.
But it would have been him in that aircraft, should have been … had Admiral Vaughn not pulled him off the flight line.
Suppressing a shudder, he walked toward CAG, who was leaning against a console, studying the radar returns of approaching aircraft.
“Tombstone!” Hitman said. “Where ya goin’?”
“To get me an airplane!”
“Well, hey! Wait for me!”
0803 hours, 26 March
CIC, U.S.S. Vicksburg
“Goddamn it to hell.” Vaughn rubbed his chin with one hand. His own skin felt clammy and cold. “Goddamn it to hell …”
“Damage isn’t too bad,” the radio voice continued. “Minor fires in some stored paint abaft the chain locker, but fire parties have those in hand. Casualties so far are light, but a muster’s probably going to turn up some missing men blown off the deck.
“Our worst operational damage is to the catapults. One and Two are both down, and the cat crews are not real optimistic about getting them up again any time soon. There was some minor buckling to the deck, and the steam lines to the forward catapults are out.”
“Shit,” Vaughn snapped. “Are they still up at the waist?”
The radio operator passed on the admiral’s question.
“Three and Four are still operational,” was the reply. “Good pressure, and no apparent damage. We have DC parties checking them now.”
“Well, that’s something, anyway,” Vaughn said.
“It’s going to restrict operations, Admiral,” Captain Bersticer said, frowning. “They’ll have to shift aircraft aft to the waist to continue launching … and they won’t be able to simultaneously launch and recover aircraft. Operation Mongoose is supposed to go down in four hours. We’ll never make it without four working cats.”
Vaughn stared at Bersticer for a moment as the words sunk in. If they couldn’t launch the strike against the Indian supply columns … They had failed. He had failed, and before they’d even had a proper chance.
His fists clenched at his side, the frustration, the rage of the past twelve years surging up inside like a black, unstoppable tide.
It’s not fair! he thought. It’s not-fucking-fair!
0803 hours, 26 March
CATCC, U.S.S. Thomas Jefferson
“I want that airplane, CAG,” Tombstone said, cold steel behind each word. “It’s criminal idiocy to keep me here when we need aviators out there!”
CAG looked at Tombstone with level eyes. “What are you going to fly?” he said. “Two-oh-one just augered in.”
“Two double-nuts,” Tombstone replied immediately. “It’ll fly.”
He’d been spending his time since being put in hack catching up with his squadron’s paperwork. Tomcat 200, the aircraft in Viper squadron traditionally reserved for the CAG when he flew, had not been operational since before Wonsan. Stored in the aft hangar bay for repairs at the time, the F14 had been damaged during the battle at Sattahip Bay in Thailand when a rebel attack sent a rocket through an open elevator door and into the parked airplanes on the hangar deck. It was one of the two aircraft in VF95 with a maintenance downcheck.
Maintenance personnel had only finished installing a new engine a week earlier. The job had been inspected, but not tested. No one knew for sure yet if Two-double-nuts would run.
Or fly.
“Stoney,I know how you feel,” CAG said gently. “But I can’t authorize a damn-fool stunt like-“
Tombstone jerked a thumb at the bulkhead speaker. The voices of several aviators could be heard calling to one another. “My God, look at that!” a voice was saying. “One-oh-three, we have bogies inbound! Bogies inbound at fifty miles!”
“Those are my people out there, damn you,” Tombstone said, his voice carrying a deadly edge to it. “My people!”
“The plane’s not armed.”
“It’ll take twenty minutes to slip some Sidewinders on her. It’ll take that long just to get the rest of VF97 aloft with only two cats working.” Tombstone’s voice raised suddenly to a shout, and every head in CATCC turned in their direction. “Damn it, CAG! I’m going with or without your say-so, but I’m going!”
“You’re an asshole, Stoney,” CAG said. He shook his head. “And if you don’t watch your mouth the brig is where you’re going!” The two men stopped, staring eye to eye. Then CAG looked away. “So you’d better go before you say something that makes me put you there. Who’s your RIO?”
“Me, sir!” Hitman said.
Tombstone turned, surprised. He’d forgotten Costello was behind him.
“Hell, Stoney,” Hitman continued with a shrug. “I’d rather be your RIO than stay here and get shot at!”
“Get into your flight gear, gentlemen,” CAG said. “And get the hell out to your ship. I’ll inform the Boss you’re coming.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“Shut up and git. Before I shoot you for desertion.”
Tombstone got.
“Commander?”
Tombstone stopped and turned. Three sailors were sitting at one of the consoles, watching him. By the light of a nearby radar screen he recognized the one who had spoken: Seaman David Howard, the sailor who’d become a hero at Bangkok.
“Good luck, sir,” Howard said.
“That’s right, Commander,” one of Howard’s companions said. The name stenciled over the pocket of his dungaree shirt read, “Gilkey, F.” The man gave him a sharp thumbs-up. “Beat the shit out of the bastards.”
“We’re right behind you, sir,” the third man, a second-class radarman, said. His shirt carried the name Be
nedict. “Kick some ass for us!”
It was strange. Tombstone did not know Gilkey or Benedict. A supercarrier was large enough that it was possible to live and work aboard her for months on end and never meet all the people aboard.
But these men certainly seemed to know him. Young Howard must have been shooting off his mouth, he decided. Still, it was a good feeling to know that he had men like these in his corner. It would make the sky a lot less lonely.
Tombstone grinned and tossed them a casual salute. “Watch my back, guys.”
Then he was through the door and pounding down the passageway toward the VF-95 Ready Room.
CHAPTER 21
0805 hours, 26 March
Tomcat 216
Batman took the Tomcat up to twenty thousand feet, giving Malibu a clear view on the radar for sixty miles in every direction as they searched for the Indian fighter that had given them the slip. There were plenty of targets in the area, but the unidentified bogies seemed to be drawing off toward the east and Batman wasn’t about to follow them, not when there were at least ten of them and only one of him.
“Any sign of the bastard, Mal?” He was still feeling stupid for having forgotten about the Sea Harrier’s incredible maneuvering capability.
“He could be one of those guys on the run,” Malibu said. “Or he could be wave-hopping to hide in the surface clutter. What you wanna do?”
“I don’t know,” Batman said. He was still feeling shaken by the encounter, and more shaken still by the sudden loss of Army and Dixie.
That Sea Harrier must have put a heat-seeker into Army just as he was breaking off from his pursuit of the enemy missile. Two-oh-one had dropped from the screen like a stone. Then, nothing.
Batman had already made one quick pass over the area looking for chutes, but had seen nothing before Jefferson’s CATCC chased them away. A helo, they’d been tersely informed, was on its way to look for the downed aviators. The carrier’s automated point defense was on and random overflights of the area would be dangerous. “We’re picking up a ninety-nine-aircraft alert,” Malibu informed him. “Those Indie planes up north. They’re moving.”
“Great,” Batman replied. “And us with one rock left to throw.”
He put the Tomcat into a hard turn, heading north.
0805 hours, 26 March
IAF Jaguar 102, Okha
Colonel Jamall Rajiv Singh felt himself pressed back into his ejection seat as his SEPECAT Jaguar hurtled down the runway, then lifted into a morning sky of blue and gold. The runway vanished beneath the belly of his aircraft, replaced immediately by the murky blue-green waters of the Gulf of Kutch.
“Okha tower, Jaguar One-zero-two airborne,” he said over the radio.
“Coming right to one-seven-five.”
“Roger, One-zero-two,” the control tower replied. “Switch to tactical command, three-five-five point three. Over.”
He put the aircraft into a gentle right-hand turn. Water gave way to gravel, scrub brush, and palm trees as he circled back over the Kathiawar Peninsula. Looking up through his canopy, he could see other elements of the massive Indian air armada gathering above him.
“Switching to three-five-five point three, roger.” He adjusted the frequency on his radio. “Rama Command, Rama Command,” he called. “This is Python Strike Leader, Jaguar One-zero-two. Do you read, over?”
“Python Strike Leader, this is Rama Command. We read you. You are clear to proceed.” The new voice sounded tense, even harsh.
What do you have to be worried about? Singh thought, silently questioning the voice. “Very well, Rama. We’re on our way.”
Below, the dun-colored wastes of the western tip of Kathiawar blurred past, then gave way once more to the sea, the deep, cobalt blue of the Arabian Sea this time instead of the muddy shallows of Kutch. Around him, the other Jaguars of his flight group closed up, settling into the tight formation that they would hold for most of the trip to the target.
Singh was uncomfortably aware that this mission would have little in common with his strike against the American supply ships two days before. That attack had been against relatively undefended targets and in the confusion of night. This time, the enemy was fully warned and prepared, aircraft in the sky and ready, ships on full alert. It was going to be a blood-bath.
He was afraid.
0808 hours, 26 March
IAF Fulcrum 401, Jamnagar
Sixty miles to the east of Okha, a pair of sleek Indian Air Force Mig-29 Fulcrums lifted into the sky above the airfield at Jamnagar, their landing gear folding into their bellies while they were still a few meters above the tarmac.
Lieutenant Colonel Ramadutta cleared his flight with Jamnagar Tower and set his fighter on a south-southwesterly course.
For Ramadutta, the coming battle would be a chance at recovering some measure of his pride. The near-encounter with the American Tomcat in the dark night sky thirty-five hours before had left him shaken, questioning his own abilities as one of India’s elite pilot corps. In his last encounter, he’d run. Nothing had been said officially, but the knowledge that his failure could have led to the destruction of several Indian Jaguars during their successful strike against the American supply ships had left him with a burning shame … and a need to clear his honor, before his family, his comrades, and himself.
When his squadron, what was left of it, had been transferred back to Jamnagar the evening before, he’d wondered if he was going to be able to fly again.
As fighters and strike planes scrambled, he knew the answer. He would face his fear … and the American enemy in the skies above India.
His mission this time, the mission of his squadron, was to protect the Indian naval and air force strike aircraft that were deploying to attack the American and Soviet squadrons. But it would be more than that. He knew, beyond any doubt, that within minutes he would again be engaged in single combat.
He was having difficulty sorting out his own fiercely intertwined emotions — determination, fear, shame.
But more than anything else, Lieutenant Colonel Munir Ramadutta was angry.
0812 hours, 26 March
CIC, U.S.S. Vicksburg
Admiral Vaughn was angry, and he didn’t know how much longer he could control it. He raised his fist, shaking it under the nose of a startled Soviet Chief of Staff.
“You Commie son of a bitch!” he shouted. Heads turned throughout the Aegis cruiser’s command center. “If this damned alliance is going to amount to anything, Captain, then you people had better get off your asses and into the air, don’t you think?”
“Please, Admiral,” Captain First Rank Sharov said. “I have no authority.”
“Then get some authority, damn it! You’re in touch with your carrier now?”
“Da, Admiral. But the necessary permission from Moskva …” He shrugged helplessly. “We have received no orders.”
Vaughn stopped himself, took a deep breath, then swallowed. He allowed his voice to drop, to become dangerous. “Son, if you don’t clear things so that Kremlin can start launching planes and help defend this so-called joint task force-” He paused once more and licked his lips.
When he spoke again, it was with a blast of raw fury that forced the Russian back a step. “I’m going to open fire on your fucking fleet myself!”
“I … will see what is to be done, Admiral.”
“Do it! Get out of my sight and don’t show yourself until you have some aircraft in the sky doing their part!” He whirled as an American lieutenant cleared his throat at his back. “What the hell do you want?”
“Sir! The Indian aircraft seem to be making their move.”
Until now, the armada that had been rising from airfields from Okha to Bombay had simply been gathering, waiting and circling beyond Jefferson’s air defense zone like a flock of buzzards.
“You’re sure?”
“Yes, sir. We have an estimated twelve strike aircraft — probably Jaguars — crossing into our outer defense zone south
of Okha. We have ten more out of Jamnagar, big ones, possibly old Canberras. Range is now eighty miles.”
“What about the Sea Harriers?”
“They’ve engaged with our BARCAP thirty to fifty miles southeast of the Jefferson. No news yet.”
“Okay,” Vaughn said. He wiped his face with his hand and was surprised at how cold it felt. “Okay. How’s the Jeff doing?”
“Ten Tomcats are aloft now, sir, and they’re continuing launch operations from their waist cats. That’s in addition to two Hawkeyes, four Prowlers, two tankers, and a couple of ASW Vikings.”
“Good, good.” But it wasn’t good. He hoped the people in Jefferson’s CATCC knew what the hell they were doing. With that many planes in the sky, keeping them all fueled was going to be a bitch with only two working catapults.
And there were no bingo fields ashore if someone miscalculated and planes started running out of gas.
“Things sound pretty confused over there, Admiral,” the lieutenant continued. “But CATCC reports that they’ll have sixteen Tomcats up within the next ten minutes.”
Sixteen? He tallied them in his mind. Right. Ten from VF-97 and eight from VF-95. Minus one shot down a few minutes ago, and another tipped into the drink by a catapult malfunction.
Against an aerial armada of well over a hundred Indian aircraft. Most of those would be strike planes, clumsy with bombs and rockets for the fleet. But still … “Very well,” Vaughn said. “Keep me posted.”
“Aye, aye, sir.”
Vaughn watched the lieutenant hurry away and found himself, unaccountably, thinking of the Battle of Midway.
It was strange comparing that battle with what would probably go down in the history books as the Battle of the Arabian Sea. Midway, remembered now as the turning point in the Pacific campaign of World War II, was the subject of intensive study by every Naval cadet at Annapolis, and its lessons were part of the training and background of every U.S. Naval command and staff officer.
Beyond the obvious — the facts that this battle, like Midway, would probably be fought with the two fleets never coming within sight of one another, and that air power would be the dominant arm in the clash — there were few similarities. The Indians would be relying primarily on their airfields ashore to smash the American force. At Midway, American land-based aircraft had been largely ineffectual.
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