The Intruders jg-6

by Stephen Coonts

  “What happened?” he asked Jake.

  “They gave me a late wave-off, sir. I was almost at the ramp, or at it. Somebody said something about the deck going foul. Whatever, at the time all I knew was that the red lights were flashing and the LSO was shouting. So I did my thing. I was just too close.”

  Haldane was watching his eyes as he spoke. When he finished speaking the colonel gave him another five seconds of intense scrutiny before he asked, “Did you do everything right?”

  Jake Grafton swallowed hard. This just wasn’t his day. “No, sir. I didn’t. I knew we had passed the wave-off point, so I was concentrating on the ball and lineup. When the wave-off lights came on, I guess I was sorta stunned there for a tenth of a second. Then I reacted automatically — nose up, boards in, full power. I should have given her the gun and got the boards in, but I should have just held the nose attitude. Should have rode it into a bolter.”

  Haldane’s head bobbed a millimeter. “Are you up to two more?” he asked.

  “I think so, sir.”

  “If you don’t want to go I’ll back you up. No questions asked.”

  “I’d like to go now, sir, if we can get a bird.”

  “How many carrier landings do you have?”

  “Before today, sir, three hundred twenty-four.”

  “How many at night?”

  “One hundred twenty-seven, I believe.”

  Haldane nodded. “Whenever I have a close call,” he said, “the first thing to go afterward is my instrument scan. I get way behind the plane, fixate on just one instrument. Really have to work to keep the eyeballs moving.”

  “Yessir,” Jake said, and grinned. He liked the way Haldane used himself as an example. That was class. “I’ll keep it safe, Skipper,” Jake added.

  “Fine,” said the colonel, and went into Flight Deck Control to see the handler.

  * * *

  “A thank-you letter to Jesus, huh?”

  “That was the best I could do on the spur of the moment. Don’t hold it against me.”

  “Amen to that.” Jake sighed and tried to relax. They were sitting behind the jet-blast deflector for Cat One, waiting for the A-7 ahead to do his thing. Jake tugged at the VDI reflexively and wriggled to get his butt set in the seat.

  He was still feeling the aftereffects of adrenaline shock, but he knew it, so he forced himself to look at everything carefully. Wings locked, flaps and slats out, stabilator shifted, roger the weight board, ease forward into the shuttle, throttles up and off brakes, cat grip up, wipe out the controls, check fuel flow, RPM, EGT…Lights on and bam! they were hurling down the catapult into the blackness.

  Off the pointy end, nose up, gear up, climbing…

  It went well until he got onto the ball, then he couldn’t get stabilized. Too nervous. Every correction was too big, every countercorrection overdone. The plane wobbled up and down on the glide slope and went from fast to slow to fast again. He was waggling the wings trying to get properly lined up as he went across the ramp and that, coupled with not quite enough power, got him a settle into the two-wire.

  The last one was more of the same. At this point Jake realized he was totally exhausted.

  “Settle down,” Flap told him in the groove.

  “I’m trying. Let’s just get this fun over with, okay?” Crossing the ramp he lowered the nose and eased the power a smidgen to ensure he wouldn’t bolter. He didn’t. One wire.

  He had to pry himself from the cockpit. He was so tired he had trouble plodding across the deck.

  “Another day, another dollar,” Flap said cheerfully.

  “Something like that,” Jake mumbled, but so quietly Flap didn’t hear it. No matter.

  * * *

  “It was a late wave-off, and I’m sorry,” Hugh Skidmore told Jake in the ready room. The LSOs were waiting for Jake when he came in. The television monitor mounted high in the corner of the room was running the PLAT tape of the in-flight engagement, over and over and over. Colonel Haldane was there, but he stood silently without saying anything. Jake and the LSOs watched the PLAT tape twice.

  “You owe me, Skidmore.”

  “Other than that little debacle, your first one — the touch-and-go — was okay, the first trap okay, the second fair, the third okay. The fifth trap was a fair and the last one a no-grade. I almost waved you off. I don’t want to see any more of that deck spotting—” After a glance at the skipper Skidmore ran out of words. He contented himself with adding, “I think you were a little wrung out on the last one.”

  Jake nodded. He had sinned there at the end and wasn’t too proud to admit it. “I spotted the deck on the last one. Sorry!” He tried to shrug but didn’t have the energy. “What about the in-flight?”

  “Gave you a fair.”

  “Fair? Now wait just a minute—” Jake knew the futility of arguing with the umpire, but that pass had cost him too much. “I had a good pass going until everything went to hell.”

  “Not all that good. You were carrying a little too much power in the middle and went fast. You made the correction but you overdid it. Approaching the ramp you were slow and settling into a two-wire when I waved you off.”

  “How do you figure that?”

  The Real McCoy spoke up. “Jake, if you had been right on a centered ball when the wave-off came, you would have missed all the wires on the wave-off. Smacking on a big wad of power should have just carried you across the wires into a bolter. Hugh’s right. You were a half ball low going lower when you gunned it. That pass would have been a fair two-wire. Look at that PLAT tape again. Carefully.”

  Jake surrendered. “I bow to the opinion of the experts.”

  “Next time keep the ball centered, huh?”

  Flap Le Beau spoke up. “There had better not be a next time. If there is, you two asshole mechanics better swim for it before I get out of the plane.” He was apparently oblivious of the presence of Richard Haldane.

  Jake glanced at the colonel to see how he was taking all this. Apparently without a flicker of emotion.

  “No, I’m serious,” Skidmore said. “If you ever get a wave-off in close like that, Jake, slam the throttles up and run the boards in, but don’t rotate. Just ride her into a bolter.”

  “But don’t go into the water waiting for the wheels to hit,” the Real added.

  Now Richard Haldane spoke. “May I have a word with you gentlemen?”

  Skidmore and McCoy went over to where the colonel was standing. Flap asked Jake, “How are you supposed to know that it’s an in-close wave-off if the LSOs can’t figure it out?”

  “The guy with the stick in his hand is always responsible,” Jake told the bombardier. “He’s the dummy who signed for the plane.”

  * * *

  After Jake and Flap debriefed both the planes they had flown that evening, Jake asked Flap if he wanted a drink.

  “Yeah. You got any?”

  “A little. In my stateroom. One drink and I’m into my rack. See you in a bit.”

  Ten minutes later Flap asked, “So Skidmore should not have waved us off, even though the cable might have parted on number three if we had caught it?”

  “Yeah. That’s right. The in-close position is defined as the point where a wave-off cannot be safely made. From that point on, in to touchdown, you are committed, like the pig. The LSO has to take you aboard no matter what. It’s a practical application of the lesser of two evils theory.”

  “Like the pig?”

  “Yeah. A chicken lays eggs, she’s dedicated. A pig gives his life, he’s committed.”

  “Where you from, anyway?”

  “Virginia. Rural Virginia, down in the southwest corner. And you?”

  “Brooklyn.”

  “All that crap you gave me this morning about Louisiana and you’re from Brooklyn?”

  “Yep. Born in the ghetto to a woman who didn’t know who my daddy was and raised on the streets. That’s me.”

  “So how did you get into the Corps?”

  Fl
ap Le Beau finished off his straight whiskey and grinned. He held up the glass. “Got any more?”

  “Help yourself.”

  When he finished pouring, Flap said, “Did you ever hear of a guy named Horowitz who funded scholarships for ghetto children?”

  “No. Don’t think so.”

  “Well, it’s sorta the in-thing for a millionaire to do these days. Publicly commit yourself to funding a college education for ten ghetto kids, or fifty, a hundred if you have the bucks. Sol Horowitz was the first. He promised to pay for the college education of a hundred first-graders in a public school in Brooklyn if they graduated from high school. I was one of the hundred. It’s sort of amazing, but I actually got through high school. Then I got caught stealing some cars and the probation officer told the judge I had this college scholarship waiting, if I would only go. So the judge sentenced me to college. I kid you not.”

  Flap sipped, remembering. Finally he continued. “I screwed around at the university. Drank and came real close to flunking out, or getting thrown out. Miracle number two, I graduated. So somebody arranged for me to meet Horowitz. I don’t know exactly what I expected. Some wizened old Jew with money sticking out of every pocket sitting in a mansion — I don’t know. Well, Solomon Horowitz was none of that. He lived in a walkup flat off Flatbush, a real dump. He looked me up and down and told me I was nothing.

  “‘You have learned nothing,’ he said. ‘You barely passed your courses — I hear you continued to steal cars. Oh yes, I have my sources. They tell me. I know.’ What could I say?

  “Horowitz asked, ‘Who do you think gave you a chance to make something of yourself? Some oil baron? Some rich Jew asshole whose daddy left him ten million? I will tell you who.’

  “He rolled up his sleeve. He had a number tattooed on the inside of his wrist. He had been in Dachau. And you know something else? When he made the promise to send those kids to college, he didn’t have any money. He made the promise because then he would have to work like hell to earn the money.”

  “Why?” Jake asked.

  “That was my question. I’ll level with you, Jake. I was twenty-two years old and I’d never met anybody in my life who wasn’t in it for himself. So I asked.

  “Horowitz thought about it for a little bit and finally said he guessed I was entitled to know. The Nazis castrated him. He could never have any children. When he got out of Dachau after the war weighing ninety-one pounds, he came to America. He wanted his life to make a difference to somebody, he said, so he promised to send a hundred kids to college, blacks and Puerto Ricans who would never have a chance otherwise. He worked three jobs, seven days a week, saved his money, invested every dime. And he did it. Actually sent thirty-two, who were all of the hundred that finished high school and could read and write well enough to get into a college. Thirty-two. He paid board, room, books and tuition and sent a little allowance every month. Twenty-three of us graduated.”

  Flap tossed off the last of the liquor and set the glass in the small metal sink jutting out from the wall.

  “I thought long and hard about the interview. I decided I wanted my life to make a difference, to make Horowitz’s life make a difference…you see what I mean. But I’m not Solomon Horowitz. All I knew how to do was drink, screw, do burglaries and fight. I wasn’t so good at stealing cars — I got caught a lot. So I picked the fìghtin’est outfit of them all and joined up.

  “They wouldn’t send me to officer candidate school because of my record. I enlisted anyway. I was full of Horowitz’s fire. I went to boot camp and finished first in my class, went to mortar school and came out first, so they made me an instructor. Got to be a pretty fair hand with a mortar and a rifle and led PT classes in my spare time. Finally they decided I might make a Marine after all, so they sent me to OCS.”

  “How did you do there?” Jake asked, even though he thought he knew the answer.

  “Number one,” Le Beau said flatly, without inflection. “They gave me a presentation sword.”

  “Going to stay in?”

  “There’s nothing for me in Brooklyn. My mother died of a drug overdose years ago. I’ve been in ten years now and I’m staying until they kick me out. The Corps is my home.”

  “Don’t you get tired of it sometimes?”

  “Sometimes. Then I remember Horowitz and I’m not tired anymore. I’ve got his picture. Want to see it?” The Marine dug out his wallet.

  Jake looked. Flap towered over Horowitz — a younger Flap togged out in the white dress uniform of a Marine officer. The old, old man had wispy white hair and stooped shoulders. His head was turned and he was looking up into the beaming face of the handsome black man. They were smiling at each other.

  “Horowitz came to Parris Island for the graduation ceremony,” Flap explained. “They gave me the sword and I walked over to where he was sitting and gave it to him.”

  “He still alive?”

  “Oh no. He died six months after this picture was taken. This is the only one of him I have.”

  * * *

  After Flap left, Jake slowly unlaced his flight boots and pulled them off. It took the last of his energy.

  If the whole cruise goes like this day has, I’m not going to make it. Russian frigates, in-flight engagements…Jesus!

  He eyed his bunk, the top one, and worked himself up to an effort. He didn’t even pull off his flight suit. Sixty seconds after his head hit the pillow he was asleep.

  6

  The ships sailed across a restless, empty ocean. Jake saw no ships other than those of the task group whenever he went on deck, which he managed to do three or four times a day. Many sailors never went topside; they spent every minute of their day in their working spaces, their berthing areas, or on the mess deck, and saw sunlight only when the ship pulled into port. Jake Grafton thought he would go stir-crazy if he couldn’t see the sea and sky and feel the wind on his face every few hours.

  He would stroll around the deck, visit with Bosun Muldowski if he ran into him, chat with the catapult crews if they were on deck, and examine planes. His eyes seemed naturally drawn to airplanes. His destination on these excursions was usually the forward end of the flight deck, where he would stand between the catapults looking at the ocean. The wind was usually vigorous here. It played with his hair and tugged at his clothes and cleaned the below-decks smells from his nostrils.

  The first morning he saw a school of whales to starboard. Knots of sailors gawked and pointed. The whales spouted occasionally and once one came soaring out of the water, then crashed down in a magnificent cloud of spray. Mostly the view was of black backs glistening amid the swells.

  When he went below this first morning at sea, reentered the world of crowded passageways, tiny offices, and never-ending paperwork, the squadron maintenance officer cornered him. “That plane you flew last night — well, we haven’t found any airframe damage yet. Maybe we dodged the bullet.” If there was no damage there would be no official report assessing blame. “The avionics took a helluva lot bigger lick than they’re designed for, though. Radar and computer and VDI are screwed up.”

  Jake threw himself into the problem assigned to him by Colonel Haldane. How would you attack a Soviet ship? Since the Soviets had all kinds of ships, he soon focused on the most capable, the guided missile cruisers that were the mainstay of their task forces, Kyndas and Krestas. After preliminary research of classified material in the Air Intelligence spaces, he paid a visit to the EA-6B Prowler squadron in their small ready room on the 0–3 level, near the number-four arresting gear room.

  This squadron had only four aircraft, but they were Cadillacs. A stretched version of the A-6, the Prowler held a crew of four: one pilot and three electronic warfare specialists. The airplane’s sole mission was to foil enemy radars. The electronic devices it used for this task were mounted in pods slung on the weapons stations. Other than the pilot’s instruments, the panels of the cockpit were devoted to the displays and controls necessary to detect enemy radar transmissions
and render the information they gave the enemy useless. Since it was a highly modified version of the A-6, the plane was popularly referred to as a Queer Six.

  The Prowler crews in Ready Eight greeted Jake with open arms. They too were stationed on Whidbey Island when ashore, and two or three of the officers knew Jake. When he finally got around to explaining his errand, they were delighted to help. The capabilities of Soviet warships were their stock in trade.

  Jake had already known that Soviet ships were heavily armed, but now he found out just how formidable they really were. Radar capabilities were evaluated, weapons envelopes examined. Finally Jake Grafton gave his conclusion: “A single plane doesn’t have much of a chance against one of these ships.” This comment drew sober nods from the two electronic warfare experts at his elbows.

  Nor, he soon concluded, did a flight of planes have much of a chance if the weapons they had to use were free-falling bombs, technology left over from World War II. Oh, free-falling bombs had been adequate in Vietnam when attacking stationary targets ashore — barely adequate — but modern warships were another matter entirely. Ships would detect the aircraft on radar while they were still minutes away. Radar would allow antiaircraft missiles to be fired and guided long before the attacker reached the immediate vicinity of the ship. Then, in-close, radar-directed guns would pour forth a river of high explosives.

  If our lucky attack pilot survived all that, he was ready to aim his free-fall weapons at a maneuvering, high-speed target. Even if he aimed his bombs perfectly, the bombs were un-guided during their eight to ten seconds of fall, so if the ship’s captain reversed the helm or tightened a turn, or if the pilot had miscalculated the wind, the bombs would miss.

  And now our frustrated aerial warrior had to turn his fanny to the fire and successfully avoid on the way out all the hazards he had penetrated on the way in.