Final Storm

by Maloney, Mack;

  Coming to the belated defense of their now-smoking armored columns, the Russians had sent 16 of their new MiG-29 Fulcrums to intercept the American attack planes.

  The Soviets had almost caught the Americans unaware, still loitering over the battlefield to survey the effects of the SADARM strike. Only Hunter’s premonition had provided them the precious split-seconds they needed to gain speed and altitude to engage the Soviet fighters.

  Two of the speedy Fulcrums peeled out of the Soviet formation and rose to chase the B-52G, whose pilot had already shrewdly assessed the situation and was pouring the coal into all eight engines to hasten his departure from the battle area. Dropping high-tech ordnance on Soviet armor was one thing—tangling with a Mach 2 enemy fighter was something else entirely, and he wanted no part of it.

  Four more Fulcrums set out after the low-flying A-10s, who were already hugging the ground and hightailing it back to the southwest. The Soviets had a speed advantage, but they would have to fly between the trees to catch the hedge-hopping Thunderbolts.

  The remaining Fulcrums headed straight for Hunter and Jones at better than Mach 2. But thanks to Hunter’s quick action, the F-16s had now gained enough altitude to meet the Soviets at their level.

  Reacting quickly, Jones hollered into the microphone and crisply dispatched orders to the 16th.

  “JT! Take Crider and save that B-52’s butt! Rico and Samuels, go cover those ’Bolts. Hawk, Ben and Christman, stay with me!”

  The general’s orders were answered with a ringing chorus of “Roger!” and the F-16 formation split into three groups.

  Jones looked over at Hunter through the scratched plexiglas canopy. He and his wingman were in the lead, with Ben and Christman following a half mile behind.

  Keying the squadron’s frequency, Jones gave the order to hold formation right through the oncoming enemy flight.

  “Falcon flight, this is Falcon leader,” he called out calmly. “Let’s hold this pattern and turn fast. Hawk and I will go at them straight on. Ben, you and Christman pick up any bandits that break formation. Cannons only. We’ll all break independent after the initial pass.”

  Absorbing the engagement orders, Wa and Christman pulled back on their throttles and increased the distance between them and the Jones-Hunter flight to about a mile and a half.

  At that point, Jones called to Hunter and said: “Think these guys are ready to play a little Chicken Kiev, Hawk?”

  “First time for everything, sir,” Hunter replied tightly. He had a suspicion of what Jones was planning and he was more than willing to trust the experienced man’s judgment, even if it did mean flying head-on into the oncoming force of Soviet MiGs.

  That was exactly what Jones had in mind.

  The general had guessed (correctly as it turned out) that the Soviet flight leader had ordered his pilots to hold their eight-plane formation, waiting for the Americans speeding headlong toward them to break away first and thus give them a clean shot. Now, Jones was hoping his surprise would be enough to rattle the superior Soviet force.

  As the distance closed between the two flights of speeding fighters, their combined approach velocity was greater than Mach 4. Holding their positions as ordered, the Soviets were dismayed to see the Americans fail to break off, depriving the Fulcrums of the opportunity to fire their AA-10 air-to-air missiles at the broad undersides of the F-16s. While the moments ticked off, the Soviet pilots tightened their hands on the control sticks in their cockpit, desperately wanting to flick the twin-engine planes off to avoid the oncoming pair of F-16s, but unwilling to do so without orders.

  Hunter’s right hand rested lightly on the side-stick controller, since he knew from experience that the slightest pressure could dart the speeding plane off course by several hundred yards in seconds.

  Moments flashed by. In little more than a split second, the two groups of airplanes would be upon each other, perhaps even colliding in mid-air.

  Hunter re-armed his 20mm rapid fire cannon and looked through his Head-Up Display at the oncoming Fulcrums. They were dangerous-looking airplanes—their twin tails seemed to knife through the sky guiding their sleek bodies. But looks alone weren’t enough to impress Hunter, or any of the other F-16 pilots, for that matter. Little did the Soviets know that the two F-16s which were at that moment hurtling right at them were being flown by members of the elite Thunderbirds aerial demonstration team.

  Now that was impressive …

  Hunter’s HUD showed target acquisition for the cannon. He pressed lightly on the fire button, not enough to engage the cannon, but just enough to make his reaction a fraction of a second quicker when the time came to shoot.

  The gap between the two adversaries was almost gone now, and Hunter could only imagine what was going through the minds of the enemy pilots. Head-on maneuvers were commonplace for the Thunderbirds team.

  He couldn’t believe the Soviets were as skilled.

  His radio came to life with Jones’s voice. “OK, Hawk, initiate Big Squeeze formation.”

  Hunter knew immediately that Jones was telling him to rotate his wings to almost vertical in order to squeeze between the closely spaced Soviet fighters. As one, the two F-16s flipped up on their wings, at last convincing the eight Soviet pilots that the F-16s were in fact committed to flying straight into them.

  It was too much for the Red pilots to take. Two of them in front suddenly started to break formation.

  But it was too late. Hunter flicked his control stick once and depressed his fire button in one fluid motion, rocking the airplane over on its wing and pouring a stream of cannon fire into one of the leading MiGs.

  The Soviet airplane seemed to stagger in midair as the heavy cannon shells exploded on its nose, wingroot and, finally, its cockpit. Three shells in all pierced the canopy glass, shattering it, and puncturing the Soviet pilot’s chest, killing him instantly. The fighter immediately spun out of control, lost altitude and began a rapid spiral down. Hunter watched as it quickly slammed into the ground and exploded on impact.

  Jones had taken out the Fulcrum flight leader in similar fashion, pumping a stream of cannon shells in the intake of his right engine, exploding it in a cloud of debris that the F-16s had to fly through as they passed the startled Soviets.

  In a flash, Jones and Hunter were through the Soviet formation, still speeding away at full AB. At the same time, Wa and Christman dove to pursue two of the Fulcrums that had broken rank just seconds before.

  Twirling around in his seat to get a visual fix on the enemy, Jones signaled to Hunter for a two-plane formation Immelmann turn—one of the countless moves from their old Thunderbird repertoire.

  The maneuver was one of the oldest in fighting aviation history, originally developed by World War I German ace Max Immelmann. A half-loop brought the planes around, and a half-roll brought them upright again; it allowed a pilot to gain altitude and reverse direction to face an enemy on his tail. Now Hunter and Jones would use the same move to fire missiles at the still-speeding Fulcrums.

  As if they were images in a mirror, the two F-16s gracefully executed the move as one, bringing their fighter planes up and around to face the tails of the Soviet MiGs. Hunter and Jones each released a Sidewinder, and the two missiles roared off their wingtips and zeroed in on separate Fulcrums. The deadly darts raced through the sky, vapor trails corkscrewing behind them. Each found its mark in the exhaust nozzle of one of the Russian MiGs, and two powerful explosions shook the air as the enemy fighters were enveloped in violent fireballs.

  Warned too late for reaction by their radar threat indicators, the remaining Fulcrums broke off to engage the F-16s in a wide-ranging dogfight. Hunter was struck by the surprising maneuverability of the Russian MiGs—a turn radius and climb rate comparable to the F-16’s, although the Fulcrum required two engines to equal the performance of the big GE turbofan that the Falcon boasted.

  Making their turns, the MiGs sent a volley of AA-10 air-to-air missiles at the two American planes. The F-16�
�s threat warning alerts began sounding as the big Soviet airborne daggers sped for their targets. Hunter rolled his plane over and over in a dizzying sideways spiral, not allowing the missile’s guidance systems to lock on to the wildly revolving jet. Missing Hunter’s plane, the missile spent its remaining fuel and plunged harmlessly to the ground.

  Jones had also evaded the two missiles fired at his plane, as did Ben Wa, who with Christman, had pulled up closer to Hunter and Jones by this time.

  The battle raged for another full minute. Then suddenly, Christman ran out of luck.

  Flying behind Hunter, he had attempted to imitate a corkscrew roll that would protect him from the Soviet missiles. But he had pulled out too soon, completing only three complete spins before he dove, upside down, out of his orbit and directly into the path of one of the big enemy arrows.

  The deadly missile struck his F-16 near the tail section and sent the fighter staggering downward, losing altitude in a death spiral. Unable to control the plane, Christman knew the control links must have been severed. His only hope now was to eject himself out of the stricken plane.

  Remembering the training program at Nellis, he quickly tightened the shoulder straps of the harness that held him to his seat. Then he reached down to his left-hand side and pulled the ejection seat release handle, instantly firing the charge that blew off the canopy, sending it flying backward into the plane’s slipstream.

  The wind buffeted his facemask and helmet visor for the longest second he’d ever lived through. Then the main explosive charge fired under his seat, rockets propelling him straight up and away from the smoking, out-of-control fighter. As the seat’s trajectory neared its peak, the spent rockets and seat platform fell away and his pilot chute deployed.

  The small parachute stabilized Christman’s fall rate and used the wind’s energy to pull the main parachute out of its carefully folded resting place.

  The big nylon circle bloomed in the sky, its spiderweb of lines cradling the dazed F-16 pilot, still shaken by the force of the ejection blast. The cold wind and shock of the chute’s opening brought him around, and his vision had just started to re-focus when he saw his plane spinning crazily below him, several miles away.

  The swirling dogfight was still going on above, and Christman found himself strangely fascinated at being so close an eyewitness to the battle.

  This is why he didn’t see the Fulcrum closing on his drifting parachute until it was too late.

  Not content with shooting the plane down, the Soviet was going to try and kill the helpless pilot. Christman turned and immediately went into shock as he watched the MiG’s nose cannon open up. Hearing and feeling the heavy cannon shells whizzing through the air around him, he was powerless to defend himself against the cowardly attack—an attack that had long been condemned by flying men of every air force in every war.

  Hunter saw the Soviet bearing down on Christman, but it was too late.

  Three rounds tore through the thin nylon chute and sliced several of the control lines. Then one cannon shell struck the dangling pilot full in the chest. The heavy shell tore through his torso, destroying several vital organs before exiting Christman’s lower back. The stricken pilot grasped the chute lines in one last desperate act, then fell limp as his bullet-ridden parachute descended rapidly.

  In a final gesture of contempt, the Fulcrum pilot passed close by the chute, near enough to fully collapse it with the powerful jet wash. Hopelessly entangled in its own rigging, the chute fell in on itself, wrapping around the lifeless form of Christman and carrying it down the several miles to the earth.

  A blind rage consumed Hunter as he pushed the throttle forward to pursue the malicious Soviet pilot. Shooting down planes was all part of the horrible game of war. But gunning down a helpless pilot after he’d bailed out was just plain cowardly murder.

  The anger which burned inside him like a piece of hot metal, radiated its heat in short pulses up into Hunter’s brain. The fire indelibly branded a mark on Hunter’s senses.

  War was war. But senseless killings had to be avenged.

  The Wingman had swooped in on the twin-tailed Fulcrum and fired his cannon from close range. But his raw anger had interrupted his usual concentration and the tracer shells went wide, just past the Soviet’s canopy. Hunter cursed as the MiG dove away.

  The MiG pilot realized the close call he’d just had, and he knew he had to get this American off his tail and fast. His best defense would be a strong offense, he thought, diving away in a fast loop.

  In seconds, the agile Fulcrum was able to twist around and rise slightly, its pilot attempting to maneuver behind and beneath Hunter’s F-16. At the same time, another MiG was drawing in close to Wa’s Falcon in a separate action nearby. Thinking quickly, Hunter swerved and fired his cannon straight into the guts of the MiG keying in on Wa, ripping away the enemy’s right wheel undercarriage and perforating its mid-fuselage fuel tank.

  No sooner had he fired when Hunter felt the hair on the back of his head stand straight up. Purely on instinct he yanked back on the F-16’s controls, putting the fighter into a steep near-vertical climb. Almost immediately he was surrounded by green-yellow tracers streaming past his canopy from below. The first Fulcrum was beneath him and only his extra-sensory sixth sense had saved him from taking the entire burst right in his belly. As it was, he felt two dull thuds on the underside of his plane, small explosions that staggered the Falcon as Hunter slammed the throttle forward. In saving Ben, Hunter had been caught by the other Soviet pilot, and now he only had one way out.

  No matter what the risk, he was going to take it.

  Hunter picked up speed as the Fulcrum’s cannon volley ceased, and he nosed the F-16 over at full speed to pull a full outside loop. With an inside loop, the pilot and plane are inside the imaginary circle drawn in the sky, and centrifugal force presses down, sometimes inducing the pilot blackout by forcing blood from his brain.

  An outside loop, however, puts the plane and pilot outside that circle, and causes a “red-out” by pumping too much blood to the pilot’s brain. In extreme cases, the resulting g-forces can actually burst a pilot’s eyes and cause bleeding from his ears.

  Hunter knew all this, but he also knew he needed to get behind the Fulcrum. He wouldn’t have time to twist around for a normal loop—the nimble MiG would be able to get away while he maneuvered.

  So he had to do it the hard way. Hunter felt the pressure building as the F-16 strained to complete the loop, wings flexing. He was committed to the move now—there was no flipping out of it at this point. He was directly upside down, at the bottom of the loop, and he could see the red veil start to rise behind his vision as the blood pressed against his retinas.

  Now his ears were popping, warning him of the pressure building inside his head. His feet and lower legs were tingling, deprived of the blood they needed. His vision became narrower, a small tunnel surrounded by a sea of crimson. He tasted blood in his mouth as a small amount oozed through his gums around his back teeth. He felt himself straining against the g-forces, desperately trying not to pass out before he completed the loop.

  It was near the breaking point for him, and the loop might have killed an average pilot.

  But Hawk Hunter was no average fighter pilot …

  He swept through the bottom of the loop, his vision still a reddish haze as the F-16 rose on the outside edge of the invisible circle. The pressure began to subside, and his head started to clear. He had done it … He was flying upright now, and he was above and behind the homicidal Fulcrum pilot.

  For his part, the MiG pilot was nothing less than bewildered. Moments before he saw the American nose over, and thought he dived away from the battle, or turned off in a wide bank to circle around. But then there was no sign of him in the sky below or to the sides.

  Where had he gone?

  His answer came from behind as Hunter laced the Fulcrum’s tail section with cannon fire from point-blank range. A relentless stream of 20mm shells poured int
o the wide, flat valley between the Soviet fighter’s rudders, igniting both engines and severing most of the tail section. Instantly half the Soviet airplane was engulfed in flames. It began breaking up and started to fall out of the sky in a ragged, fiery spiral.

  Hunter watched the pilot fumble for his ejection mechanism, and the rage burned hot within him. He changed his angle on the Russian slightly, re-aiming and firing his cannon so that the shells traced a straight path across the Fulcrum’s right wingroot, amputating the flat appendage like a surgeon’s scalpel.

  Deprived of more than half its lift, the stricken MiG fell off on its now-wingless right side in a tight spin. The rapidly increasing g-forces pinned the Russian pilot’s arms at his sides, as they suddenly became too heavy to move.

  Unable to reach his ejection handle, he realized his doom in a silent scream that lasted all the way down to the hard-packed ground, three miles below.

  Hunter followed the MiG’s wreckage down, making sure the Soviet pilot was truly finished. There was no parachute, and Hunter allowed himself a split second of unrewarding satisfaction as he watched the MiG impact into the side of a small mountain.

  The feeling of revenge didn’t last long, however. Hunter knew the Soviet pilot’s death wouldn’t bring Christman back.

  That was the problem, he thought. In war, eventually everyone loses …

  With that, he climbed back up, hoping to join the air battle that was still raging above.

  By this time, JT had doubled back to join the dogfight, assured that the B-52G was safely out of harm’s way. Working together, he and Jones had just picked off a Fulcrum that had tried to latch on to Ben Wa’s tail, as the Hawaiian was in turn flaming another MiG with his cannon.

  The surviving Russians broke off their attack at this point and headed for home, unwilling to stay and provide more ducks for the 16th’s shooting gallery.

  Hunter, still seething at the cold-blooded murder of Christman, was game to pursue the MiGs. He moved to engage his afterburner.