by Mack Maloney
The trapped soldiers emerged from the trench just as the Lynx was setting down on the road. Heath made a point of giving a bag of silver to each of the unlucky mercenaries trapped in the ambush, including a half-dozen gold coins in the bag of the man who had been carrying the lifesaving radio.
The mercenaries went on their way as Hunter, Heath, and Raleigh approached the Lynx. Humdingo himself stepped out of the aircraft, his grin even wider than before.
“Heath, old man,” he said in perfect Queen’s English. You are lucky you have such a good friend as Humdingo in Algiers.”
“Amen, chief,” Heath said, with much relief.
The Lynx pilot—he looked like a Greek to Hunter—stepped out of the chopper and approached Heath.
“Who pays?” he asked, nonchalantly.
“I do,” Heath said, reaching into his satchel to what Hunter was beginning to believe was an endless supply of money. “How much?”
The pilot stroked his thin beard. “Let’s see,” he said, doing some quick calculations. “Four TOWs, six belts of ammo, fuel, and landing fees. That’s four and a half bags of silver.”
Heath took a look at the battered jeep and dug out five full bags of silver coins.
“I’ll throw in another half bag for a lift back to the airport.”
The Greek pilot gave him the thumbs-up sign. “Done,” he said with a smile.
Chapter 11
“IRON FIST” WAS THE name of the group that controlled the territory once known as the French Riviera.
The Fist was an offshoot of a radical anarchist group that had once carried out terrorist bombings in prewar France. Back then, its members, although publicly described as “left-wingers,” were actually pseudo-political troublemakers, the sons and daughters of rich Gallic industrialists who grew bored with being wealthy and decided to kill and maim innocent people in the name of some hair-brained “People’s Revolution.” Their dream came true with the start of World War III; the Red Armies deposited their “revolutionary” SCUD poison missiles in the middle of Europe on Christmas Eve, killing millions. Members of Iron Fist were crushed right alongside their bourgeois countrymen in the Soviet onslaught that followed. Many of its surviving members simply cowered in hiding places while the real armies fought the war.
Only when the guns fell silent and the beaten yet victorious Russians withdrew did the members of Iron Fist emerge from their holes and claim the once-posh Riviera as their “Liberated Zone of the People.” The comical thing about it all was that the only “people” living in the territory were the members of Iron Fist itself.
Such grade-school revolutionary foolishness was more than an inconvenience to the Sir Neil and his British adventurers. The USS Saratoga was beached 2000 feet off the territory controlled by Iron Fist. The problem was that the British Intelligence people believed Iron Fist had made some “new friends” lately. Namely, a notorious motorized division known as The Red Army Faction. They too were a band of terrorists before the war. But unlike members of the Fist, The Red Army Faction had gotten into the free-lance military business in a big way. And more than a few observers believed the Faction was supported in some part by the warlords in Moscow.
Recruiting many surviving Warsaw Pact soldiers and recovering much of their battlefield equipment, the Faction became a modern-day equivalent of the Goths—20,000 well-armed barbarians on wheels. Their specialty was sacking cities. Their military formula was simple: attack, rape, pillage, carry off slaves, and move on. They had been terrorizing central Europe since the end of the first Great Battles. No one on the continent had had the ambition to take them on. Thus, the Faction added to the instability that Moscow craved.
The Brits had suspected for some time that the Faction wanted to grab some territory in the warmer climes, at least during the European winter months. As with any army, its troops needed a place to take R&R. The Riviera was a natural choice—it gave them an outlet to the sea, plenty of living accommodations, plus an ally in Iron Fist that at least shared some of their revolutionary fervor, if in name only. And the Fist was weak enough that they could be crushed at first whine.
As it turned out, The Red Army Faction also had plans for the USS Saratoga.
If The Faction intended to make the Riviera its R&R billet, it would need some security, especially in air defense. When the two RAF commandos had first reconnoitered the carrier, they had found that someone had stripped away about a third of its ship defensive weapons, including its important antiaircraft systems. The Brits knew such an operation was beyond the limited know-how of the pampered revolutionaries of Iron Fist, yet well within the technical expertise of the Faction. When many of the missing carrier guns and SAM launchers started showing up in recon photos sitting atop the formerly luxurious casinos and mansions from Nice to Monte Carlo, the Brits knew the Faction was serious about vacationing in the south of France.
“Now, they take potshots at passing aircraft every once and a while,” Sir Neil was telling the group of officers, including Hunter, as they studied a lighted map of the Riviera. They were in the control room of a Norwegian frigate, one of four anchored in a small port on the deserted Mediterranean island of Majorca, several hundred miles to the southwest of France. “They got two airliners last week. Either their troops get bored very quickly and like playing with the ack-ack guns or it’s the Faction’s way of telling everyone that they’ve claimed some exclusive beachfront property.”
Hunter shook his head. He wondered if the battle-hardened soldiers of the Faction sat up all night playing roulette with the pussies of Iron Fist.
“The trouble is that we have very little hard information about the area,” Sir Neil continued. “We have to assume that, besides whatever Iron Fist can do, there might be at least a couple battalions of Red Army Faction soldiers lounging around the city.”
Three days had passed since Hunter, Heath, and Raleigh had left Algiers. As per their contract, four of the fifteen Norwegian frigates had arrived in Gibraltar during the night, where they had picked up a British Special Air Services battalion and a hundred of Yaz’s men and proceeded to Majorca. RAF airborne combat engineers had already secured a landing area and docking facilities on the island. The frigates arrived the following night, shortly before Hunter landed his F-16 at the island’s secret airbase, along with six heavily armed Tornados.
Now, for what seemed like the one hundredth time, Sir Neil meticulously went over the plan to retrieve the Saratoga. Those in attendance in the control room with Sir Neil and Hunter included Heath, Raleigh, two SAS officers, Yaz, and the Norwegian commander—Gjaff Olson, who was also the skipper of the command frigate.
“We have to do three things before we can even think of moving the carrier,” Sir Neil explained. “One, we have to suppress the antiaircraft guns in Villefranche. Two, we have to secure the beach—we’ll call it Gold Beach—near where the Saratoga is stuck. And three, we have to secure the Saratoga itself.
“Three Tornados will be responsible for the first objective. They will attack the town’s SAM sites. Don’t worry about whether we have justifiable provocation—remember those bastards have shot down airliners full of innocent people. As for securing Gold Beach, we’ll use the landing crafts on frigates one, two and three, and put about 600 men of the SAS battalion ashore. The choppers from those ships will stand by for any rescue duties.
“Once there, the SAS will set up an aggressive beachhead and occupy the three blocks of buildings right on the shoreline. This should give us a reasonable buffer zone and prevent anyone from Villefranche from getting close enough to accurately fire on the carrier.
“The 300 remaining SAS troopers will be in charge of boarding the Saratoga itself. We’ve got one helicopter to work with, so two squads of SAS will chopper right onto the deck of the carrier. If there is anyone aboard—either Fist or Faction—these troops will have to deal with them. The rest of the 300 will be on board this vessel, frigate four. They will move up alongside the carrier and go up on ropes
provided by the chopper squads. By that time the ship should be secure.
“Once we are certain that the carrier is in our hands, we’ll chopper about a hundred of the Yank sailors aboard. We’ll be running the whole operation from right here in frigate four.”
The room was quiet while Sir Neil let the information sink in.
“As you know, we’ll have to hold the beach for at least six hours until the Yanks can get the carrier’s primary systems running,” he continued. “Captain Olson’s men will help the Yanks install the main towlines so when O’Brien’s tugs arrive at midnight, we’ll be set to pull her off.”
The moon was with them—the tides would be ideal to float the big ship, providing everything was ready. And one of the first tasks Yaz’s men would perform would be to get the carrier’s aircraft-retrieval systems in order. Once that was done, Hunter, his F-16 already equipped with the necessary belly-attached arresting hook, would be able to land on the USS Saratoga’s flight deck. Important task number two would be to get the carrier’s aircraft-launching catapult systems working.
Hunter knew the recovery plan was solid. But he also knew all too well that the best-laid plans are usually screwed up by an uncalculated variable. Sir Neil read his mind.
“The Fist shouldn’t be that much of a problem,” he said. “But as far as the Faction soldiers on R and R, well, we have to expect the unexpected. We have to assume that they bring their equipment on liberty with them, and as they are a motorized division, this means tanks and personnel carriers. Plus they can just as easily pick up a radiophone and buy some free-lance air cover or heavy warships.
“That’s where you come in, Major Hunter. We’ll have to rely on you to counter anything unexpected, either in the air, on the sea, or on the ground.”
Hunter knew it was a tall order. But the cause was worthy.
“It’s going to take some practice to set the Tornados down on the carrier,” Sir Neil continued. “We won’t be able to do it during this operation. So only you and your F-16 have the agility to do it with so little preparation. Plus it will probably be dark by the time we get the arresting cables working. So you’ll be looking at a nighttime landing. But, for at least the time being, you’ll have to be our only recoverable aircraft. Let’s just hope the sea stays calm and it doesn’t get too sticky.”
Yaz turned to Hunter and with a wide grin said, “Welcome to the Navy, major.”
Hunter shook his head. “This is what I get for betting against Army all those years.”
The six Tornados swept in at wave-top level, rising up to 500 feet only when they were in sight of the coast of southern France. The crude radar system of the Iron Fist picked up the incoming blips about a mile out to sea. Antiaircraft guns opened up almost immediately after the airplanes passed over the first row of beachfront casinos of Villefranche. The British pilots expertly maneuvered around the deadly bursts of smoke and proceeded to select targets of opportunity. It was an hour before dusk. The opening shots in the plan to free the USS Saratoga had been fired.
Three of the Tornados split off and were soon over the beach near where the USS Saratoga lay. The three remaining British jets repeatedly twisted and turned their way above the city, firing at the ack-ack guns and lining up the not-yet-warm SAM sites for laser-guided bombs.
A little more than 10,000 feet above, Hunter orbited in his F-16. He was able to watch the action around Villefranche via his terrain-radar video system. It was like having a TV camera hovering over the battle. Meanwhile, he could see the three Norwegian frigates as they dashed for Gold Beach, their cargo of 600 SAS troopers waiting on the decks to be loaded onto landing craft and put ashore. The remaining frigate, carrying Sir Neil and the command staff, circled the Saratoga. The immobile aircraft carrier, its stern pointing directly toward the beach 2000 feet away, was a huge, imposing sight, dark and ominous in the middle of the now-frenetic activity.
His radar picked up the blip of the approaching RAF helicopter. This would be ferrying the SAS troops to be dropped onto the carrier.
So far, so good, he thought.
Hunter moved the F-16 directly over the carrier just as the Sea King chopper was setting down on the deck. He knew twenty-four SAS men were leaping out, and by the chatter on his radio he also knew that the landing on the carrier was unopposed.
He could now see the first of the landing crafts being disgorged from the frigates. Soon the first of the SAS beach troops would be splashing ashore. The trio of Tornados were methodically roaring up and down the beach at 1000 feet, carefully watching for any opposing troops. Less than a mile away, fires were beginning to erupt in the town of Villefranche as the bombing Tornados were finding targets.
That’s when Hunter felt it. Enemy aircraft. Coming his way. Six of them. Approaching from the northeast. Moving at just under Mach 1.
His hands were immediately a blur of movement. He started pushing buttons, flicking switches, punching in computer codes. A mental checklist went off in his head. Weapons systems on. Fuel reserves switched, external tanks dropped. Flight computer set for intercept. Sidewinders armed. Test-firing of his nose cannons successful.
He was ready. Now, who the hell was the enemy?
He found out soon enough. “Christ,” he murmured, looking at his radar screen. The jets were still forty miles away, but he could tell by their radar signatures that they were Dassault-Breguet Super Etendards. The airplanes were originally French-built naval strike craft, but obviously they were operating from a land base somewhere in central Europe. The Red Army Faction had indeed made the call for some free-lance air support.
“Of all the goddamn airplanes to show up,” Hunter cursed. It wasn’t the performance of the jets that bothered him. The French airplanes only had a top speed of 745 mph. His F-16 could do two and a half times that without breathing hard. Rather it was what the airplanes were armed with that was troubling. He knew Super Etendards could only be carrying one weapon: Exocets.
The Exocet was an anti-ship missile of the deadliest order. It could be fired from long- or short-range, depending on the ability and the motives of the pilot. It was programmed to deliver a 364-pound warhead of high explosive into a ship while traveling 600 mph. The missiles had made their murderous debut years ago in the Falkland Islands War. A few years later, an American frigate had been hit by one in the Persian Gulf. They flew again in the opening battles of World War III. Now Hunter knew at least six of them were heading his way.
Just as he was about to call in to Sir Neil on the Norwegian command ship, he heard one of the Gold Beach Tornados break in on the line.
“We’ve got trouble on Gold,” the cockney-accented pilot reported. “Tanks moving on beach highway from Villefranche. Looks like a gang of them—T-62s. Thirty at least. Also BMPs … ”
Goddamn! The Faction brought their tanks with them on holiday. Thirty Soviet-built tanks to boot.
Hunter flipped his radio-send switch and was immediately talking to Sir Neil. “We got six Super Etendards coming your way,” he told the British officer. “They’re probably loaded with Exocets.”
“Christ, Hunter,” the reply came back. “Who are they and what’s their bloody position?”
“Probably free-lancers, coming in a two-seventy Tango,” Hunter said, noting the aircraft were now just thirty miles away and staggering their flight pattern into three groups of two. The enemy planes were starting a long arc out over the sea. “They are getting in their attack positions now. You’d better red-alert everyone on the ships. Once those Exocets are launched, they’ll hit the first thing that configures to their computer ‘ship-ID’ profile. And that includes the carrier.”
There was a burst of static, then Sir Neil’s voice came through: “Hunter, can you hold them, man? We’ve got tanks moving toward the SAS guys on Gold. All six Tornados are being vectored there right now!”
“Roger,” Hunter replied, turning toward the Super Etendards and kicking in his afterburner. “You take care of the tanks. I’ll go after
these guys … ”
Almost immediately the red alert was flashed to the Norwegian frigates. Their crews started to take countermeasures. The Exocet was a radar-homing missile. Hundreds of ship profiles were locked into its computer memory. Once a profile took hold via the missile’s on-board radar, the rocket would set a course right for its center. To counteract this, the Norwegian sailors started firing chaff rockets—small projectiles containing millions of ultra-thin, metalized, fiberglass wires. The cloud of chaff was designed to confuse the Exocet’s radar-homing device by mimicking several attractive radar targets. It was a good idea, but in reality the chaff defense worked about half the time.
Hunter put the 16 into a screaming dive and was instantly in the airspace between the attacking airplanes and the ships. Already he knew the lead Super Etendard had released a missile. The mini-blip on his radar screen confirmed it. He coolly set a path directly for the oncoming computerized projectile. The F-16 was traveling at 1100 mph and the Exocet was coming at him at nearly 650 mph.
“This won’t take long,” he thought.
Sure enough, five miles away he saw the telltale trail of smoke coming from the sea-skimming missile heading straight at him. He held the F-16 steady, barely flicking the aircraft’s side-stick controller. Now the missile was just three miles away. He counted off 1-2-3, then squeezed his cannon trigger. The Vulcan Six Pack roared in response, sending up a wall of lead. The missile and the cannon shells met a split-second later head on. A huge yellow explosion lit up the late afternoon sky. When the smoke cleared, nothing was left but cinders.
Even before the Exocet exploded, Hunter had launched a Sidewinder at the lead Super Etendard. The missile raced toward the attacking aircraft. An explosion off on the horizon ten seconds later confirmed the lead airplane had been hit.