Dark Wing

by Richard Herman

  Moose wouldn’t let it go. “What about Orly and Benny?”

  LaGrange wanted to touch the distraught captain. Her voice was sad and very low. “They had a bad day, Moose.” She let it sink in. “Let’s get to work. We got some Warthogs to save.” He shook his head and headed for his console.

  Sunday, October 20

  Near Wuzhou, China

  Pontowski firewalled his throttles when he yelled “Circle the Hogs” and sideslipped away from Maggot. “Head south,” he ordered.

  Snake Bartlett, the lead for Pontowski’s second element of two, saw the bandits and knew Maggot was a sitting duck. He led his wingman, Dirtbag, into a high-speed rejoin and fell in behind Pontowski, who was now turning in front of the much slower Maggot. Another element of two led by Skid Malone was right behind Dirtbag. “Skid’s in,” Malone transmitted. The five Warthogs were now flying in a circle around Maggot, who was heading south. Pontowski could see smoke coming from the secondary target but had lost his wingman. “Buns,” he transmitted, “we’re in a wheel around Maggot. Do you have us in sight?”

  “Negative,” came the reply.

  “Head for home plate,” Pontowski told him.

  “Rog,” Buns replied. “Tally on the bandits. They’re on you. Expect company. I’m outa here.”

  Pontowski counted six bandits entering a CAP high above and to the west of the Warthogs. “What the hell are they doing?” Pontowski mumbled to himself. He estimated the bandits’ altitude at twenty thousand feet. Time to use Maggot’s eyeballs. “Maggot, say number of bandits.”

  Maggot’s answer was immediate. “Six. Probably the same dudes we saw inbound to target.”

  “Same count,” Snake chimed in, confirming Maggot’s number. “Maybe,” he added, “they haven’t seen us.”

  “Or they’re sorting us out,” Skid said.

  Pontowski wanted to know what had happened to the other bandits. He keyed his radio to call the AWACS. “Phoenix, say bandits.” No reply.

  “What the hell happened to Phoenix?” Snake asked.

  Good question, Pontowski thought. Moose had originally called twenty-two bandits and now there were only six.

  “Shee-it,” Maggot radioed. “I got two more bandits stacked above the formation.”

  Maggot and his good old Mark One eyeballs, Pontowski thought. Then another thought came to him. Those must be the same two that had been playing Chinese “eye-in-the-sky.” Something was different. “Maggot, how you doing?”

  “Not too bad. I’ve lost right hydraulics but the left’s okay. Controllability checks okay and I’m not losing fuel. I get a heavy vibration and start to shed skin when I push my airspeed above one-sixty.”

  “So how’s the airplane doing?” Dirtbag asked. It was too good a line to pass up.

  “Heads up,” Snake called. “Here they come.” The bandits were peeling out of their CAP and diving single file.

  I’ll be damned, Pontowski thought, just like a World War II movie. “Go for the weeds,” he transmitted. It was an instinctive reaction for the six Warthogs—get as low as possible. The slow-moving Maggot dropped down to one hundred feet above the deck while the other five circled above him at two hundred feet. “Let’s see how they like dodging rocks,” Pontowski said to himself. He selected AIM-9 on the armament panel and called up the air-to-air mode on his head-up display. “Looks like a one-pass, haul-ass attack,” he transmitted.

  At altitude, the J-8s would have chewed the Warthogs apart in a sequential, high-speed hit-and-run attack. But Pontowski had significantly altered the odds by forcing the J-8s to engage in his environment. The Chinese pilots would have to contend with the A-10’s turning capability while avoiding the ground.

  Pontowski’s jaw turned granite hard and his mouth compressed into a thin line as he watched the lead J-8 swoop down in a twenty-degree dive. He estimated its airspeed around six hundred knots, just below the Mach. “Too fast, you fucker!” he shouted to himself. The Chinese pilot had forced himself into early missile shot and pull out. It was that or hit the ground. Like most Warthog drivers, Pontowski wasn’t proud and considered a kill a kill, even if his opponent did it to himself by digging his own grave in the ground.

  The J-8 drivers were in for a nasty surprise.

  Snake was in position when the first J-8 came inside three miles. He wrenched his Warthog’s nose around onto the J-8 and brushed the trigger. The GAU-8 cannon belched and gunsmoke streamed from the nose, a very visible warning the cannon was firing. The Chinese pilot reacted instinctively and jinked to his right, destroying any chance to employ his air-to-air missiles. As expected, he zoomed out of the fight. Snake rejoined the wheel, which was now bigger because of his momentary turn onto the J-8. Skid was next and did the same to the second J-8 that was coming at them.

  The result was the same. The Chinese pilots had not trained to engage so low and at such a high speed. And it was very disconcerting to be looking at the nose of a Warthog belching smoke when the ground was rushing up to meet them. But the third pilot was of a different cut than the first two. He throttled back and extended his speed brakes. At the same time, he increased his dive angle. He bottomed out of his dive five hundred feet above the ground, three miles from the Warthogs. Now he firewalled his throttles and angled in on the right rear quarter of the Warthog in front of him—Pontowski. He had a clean shot and launched two of his missiles.

  Much to his surprise, both Pontowski and the trailing Warthog turned on him. His missiles lost the heat signature they were homing on when Pontowski rotated his jet exhaust away. The two PL-2 missiles functioned as designed and went ballistic. The distinctive smoke trail of an AIM-9 Sidewinder missile streaked at him from the second Warthog as gunsmoke erupted from Pontowski’s nose. The pilot reacted instinctively and jinked hard, fighting for his own survival. It was good enough to avoid the wild cannon shot coming from Pontowski but not the Sidewinder. Then he remembered: The American’s AIM-9L was an all-aspect missile with a cooled infrared seeker head that could track head-on. It was his last coherent thought as the Sidewinder exploded in his left intake.

  The last three J-8s aborted their run and pulled off high. They all returned to the CAP.

  “Ops check,” Pontowski called. “Lead has four thousand.” Again, the Warthogs checked in with their fuel readings. Pontowski checked his INS and ran the numbers through his head—he had approximately forty minutes of fuel remaining at full throttle. They had to hit the tanker. “Phoenix, how read this frequency?” he transmitted. Nothing. He checked his knee board for the tanker’s frequency.

  “Bossman”—it was Moose’s voice—”Phoenix reads you five-by. How me?”

  “Five-by,” Pontowski answered. It was hard to keep his voice cool and calm. He wanted to ask where the hell they had been. That could wait until later. “Bandits stacked above us and we need to rendezvous on Prima for refueling.”

  “Rog,” Moose answered. “We’ve tagged the bandits and are talking to Prima now. Maintain your present heading. Can you push your airspeed up?”

  “Negative, Phoenix. We’re flying cover for a wounded Hog.”

  “Major,” Moose Penko said over the AWACS intercom, “we’ve got something strange goin’ on.” Even though he disliked LaGrange, Moose knew who was in charge. As long as she was the MCC, he would be subordinate.

  “Whatcha got, Moose?” LaGrange was plugged into her long communications extension cord and was leaning over his right shoulder.

  “It’s these two bandits stacked above the other five. They’re established in a race track pattern at forty thousand.”

  LaGrange saw it immediately. The computer was marking the track of the two bandits stacked above the CAP with a dashed line. “Right. And the axis of the race track points straight at Bossman.” She racked her brain, trying to recall everything she had read about the J-8. “It’s like they’re tracking Bossman flight on radar,” she said.

  “We sold the Chinese the AN/APG-66 radar for the J-8,” Moose said. “Can i
t do that?” The relationship between the two officers would never be smooth and harmonious, but they made an effective team. “Oh, oh,” he muttered. “Here they go.”

  He stomped his foot pedal to transmit. “Bossman, four bandits zero-four-five, at twelve, descending through ten thousand. On you.” He studied his screen for a moment. The Chinese had broken up into flights of two flying line abreast and were descending fast. Again, he relayed the warning. Then he saw it. “Bossman!” he was yelling into his mike. “Bandits co-altitude. On the deck. Splitting apart. Pincers.”

  “Damn!” Pontowski yelled. This was the most aggressive bunch of Chinese pilots they had engaged. A pincers, he thought. Well, the wheel was still his best defensive maneuver. He cursed the Warthog’s slow speed. “Heads up,” he transmitted. “Make them come to us and engage.” He was on the far side of the circle when the first two J-8s closed into firing range. He watched as Snake turned into the J-8 coming in on the right. Five seconds later, Dirtbag, Snake’s wingman, turned into the J-8 closing from the left. Snake took the first shot with a Sidewinder, forcing the J-8 to jink wildly to avoid the missile. The missile missed and the J-8 headed straight for Maggot.

  Dirtbag launched a Sidewinder on his bandit at the same time the J-8 fired a PL-2 at him. The missiles raced toward each other as the Warthogs and J-8 turned hard to avoid the missiles headed their way.

  Pontowski pulled into the vertical when he saw the first J8 heading for Maggot. He came across the top, well above Maggot. Sweat poured off his face, stinging his eyes as he grunted and pulled hard into a left turn. His airspeed rapidly bled off as his nose came around onto the J-8. He fought the gs, feeling his weight quadruple, then quintuple. The chopped stall warning tones bitched at him as the J-8 flashed in front and below him, turning hard away. The Chinese pilot had seen Pontowski’s nose come onto him and rightly assumed that a Sidewinder would soon be coming his way if he persisted in the attack. He chose to live and for the moment, Maggot was safe.

  But any cohesion the Warthogs might have had was gone. The first two J-8s had broken the wheel apart and turned it into a true furball. The second two J-8s were in firing range and exploited the confusion. Pontowski saw the first missile come off the rail of the J-8. “Dirtbag!” he radioed. “Hard left!” But it was too late. The missile fired at Dirtbag was not a PL-2 but a PL-7, a much more advanced version with a 180-degree acquisition angle. Its seeker head had no trouble following the heat signature of Dirtbag’s A-10 as he turned into the threat. The missile curved in behind the doomed Warthog.

  The rear of Dirtbag’s jet exploded in a fireball and for a fraction of a second, only the A-10’s nose was visible. “Dirtbag! Eject! Eject!” Pontowski called. It was too late. The aircraft tumbled into the ground. One of the J-8s flashed in front of Pontowski, barely missing him. Now they were gone.

  The sequential pincers attack had been a tradeoff—one J-8 exchanged for one Warthog. Pontowski forced himself not to think of the pilot inside the A-10. He had liked the easygoing man called Dirtbag.

  Would they come back? Pontowski mashed his transmit button, almost breaking it off. “Phoenix, say bandits.”

  “Disengaging,” Moose answered. “Headed to the east.” Fuel had finally forced the J-8s to disengage. “Two bandits are still at forty thousand, fifteen miles north of your position.” Flying at loiter speed at forty thousand feet had conserved fuel for the two bandits hawking the fight.

  “Ops check,” Pontowski called to his flight. “Lead has three-point-two.” Thirty-two hundred pounds of fuel remaining. The replies drove his next decision. The constant circling in the wheel around Maggot and the last engagement had eaten into their remaining fuel. All but Maggot were nearing bingo fuel. He had to get them to a tanker. “Snake, take ‘em to Prima for refueling. I’ll stay with Maggot. Those two bandits can’t stay up there forever. Get Prima headed my way when they go away. Phoenix, you copy?”

  “Rog,” Moose answered. “Snake, fly two-one-zero. Tanker on your nose at one-twenty.”

  A hundred and twenty miles to get a drink, Pontowski calculated. They should make it. He wasn’t so sure about himself and Maggot.

  Aboard the AWACS, Moose was grumbling at the ASO. “Those two Gomers keep hawking the fight. What the hell are they doing?”

  “Beats the hell out of me,” the ASO replied. “We’re watching them.”

  LaGrange was studying Moose’s monitor over his shoulder. A tickling at the back of her mind kept nagging her. Time to experiment. “Moose, the bandits are pointed at Snake. Tell Snake’s flight to strangle their IFFs.” Moose shot her a hard look. Without a radar transponder, the A-10s would be much more difficult for the AWACS to track.

  He did as she ordered. “Snake, strangle squawks.” The three dots in front of him changed color, telling him the AWACS’ radar was now only receiving skin paints.

  “Those two hawking the fight will look for Bossman now,” she predicted.

  “Sure,” Moose replied, his doubt obvious. He watched as the computer traced the axis of the race track pattern. It moved and was pointed directly at Pontowski and Maggot. The J-8s were definitely tracking the two Warthogs. But how? Then it came to him. “I’ll be,” he whispered. He turned and stared at LaGrange with a new respect. How had she figured it out? “They’re in a world of hurt,” he said.

  “Not if you do your job right,” she replied. Again, she set the challenge for Moose. His jaw hardened. “Vector Bossman to the Dragon’s Teeth,” she said. “Fly ‘em right into the Gullet and hide them.”

  “Rog,” Moose answered. His blunt forefinger punched at a button labeled “Restricted Area.” Moose had programmed the Dragon’s Teeth into the system as a restricted area and now the DIODT, the drum initialize override data tape, was doing its magic. His monitor screen flickered and a red rectangular box appeared—the Dragon’s Teeth. “Bossman, snap two-niner-five for Dragon’s Teeth.” The two dots that were Pontowski and Maggot headed for the box, away from the tanker.

  “They’ll trust you,” LaGrange told him.

  Again, the computer trace for the bandits moved, still pointed at Pontowski and Maggot. Sweat poured off Moose, drenching his flight suit.

  “You don’t sweat much for a fat boy,” LaGrange told him. It was her way of encouraging him.

  Sunday, October 20

  The Sino-Vietnamese border, China

  Lieutenant Colonel Sung Fu was standing outside the control van enjoying a cigarette when the door opened and the captain said his presence was requested inside. From the quiver in his voice, Sung was certain that something had gone wrong. He took a last drag on his cigarette and exhaled slowly before he entered.

  “Sir,” the captain stammered, “the observation posts report another aircraft.” Sung said nothing and waited. “It is established in the same orbit.” The man was shaking.

  “And,” Sung said.

  “Observation post sixteen—” he gulped, “claims it is the AWACS.”

  “But it was reported destroyed,” Sung hissed. “How many AWACS do the Americans have?”

  “I don’t know, sir,” the captain answered. He was shaking—hard.

  “Then it must not be the AWACS,” Sung shot at him. “Since you destroyed it,” he added ominously. “The problem is easily solved,” he continued. “As you shot the AWACS down, you only have to find the wreckage. Do so and report back here by twelve noon.” A hard silence came down in the control van as the captain ran out the door.

  “I want Sergeant Lu outside,” Sung said into the silence, “standing at attention.”

  The plotter, the communications operator, and the launch/guidance operator exchanged knowing glances. A double execution would precede their midday meal.

  Sunday, October 20

  Near the Sino-Vietnamese border, Vietnam

  LaGrange studied Moose’s video monitor and verified that the two bandits were on Bossman and Maggot. “Moose, those two bandits hawking the fight might have a radar transponder …”


  Moose completed the thought. “That can interrogate our IFFs.”

  “I misjudged you,” LaGrange said. “You are a rocket scientist after all. I’m willing to bet half your sex life that those two jets are using our own IFFs to find us. When Snake strangled his squawk, they lost him. Notice how they are on opposite legs of the race track and how one always has its nose on Bossman?” She keyed her intercom to speak to the airborne radar technician. “Slovic, strangle our IFF interrogator.” The AWACS would now have to rely only on radar skin paints to track the two A-10s.

  Moose nodded. He and LaGrange were in sync. He tromped his foot pedal to talk to Pontowski. “Bossman, check your IFF panel and tell me when you’ve got an interrogation light.” The hours Moose had spent studying the A-10 were now paying dividends. A green light on the A-10’s IFF panel blinked whenever it replied to an interrogation by another radar. Most Warthog drivers considered the light a distraction and tweaked its lens closed. If LaGrange was right, the green light would blink when the Chinese interrogated Bossman’s IFF.

  “It’s blinking at me about every ten seconds,” Pontowski transmitted.

  Moose looked at LaGrange. “Should I tell him it’s not us interrogating him?” he asked.

  LaGrange thought hard. What else have the Chinese got? Have they broken into our secure radio? We are so damn sure that it is secure that we don’t even worry about communications security. Maybe it’s time we do just that. “Negative,” she said.

  “Moose,” LaGrange explained, “that’s a pretty sophisticated capability for the Chinese to have developed on their own. And the APG-66 is a damn good pulse-Doppler radar. Have Bossman and Maggot strangle their IFFs now. Maybe that’ll shake ‘em off. When the Warthogs come out of the Gullet give them a vector south, ninety degrees to the bandits.”

  It all made sense to Moose. LaGrange was hedging her bet. If Bossman and Maggot turned their IFFs off, the J-8s would no longer be able to interrogate their transponders. At the same time, the Dragon’s Teeth would offer them good terrain making from radar. Even the AWACS’ radar had to rely on the Warthog’s IFF squawks for tracking in the Dragon’s Teeth. If they turned ninety degrees to the J-8s when they came out of the Gullet, they would be headed for the tanker and away from the J-8s. With a little luck, the J-8s might have overshot the Warthogs and be out in front of them.