Mission Compromised

by Oliver North

  He raised his head slowly and for only an inch or so in order to see over the rise in the sandy terrain. What he saw made his guts turn to liquid; the Iraqi troops who had been deployed around the cave were now crouching and moving forward in a wide semicircle. They were being joined by what looked like a company of reinforcements. Soon their ranks were filled so that they appeared as a solid line of soldiers—it reminded Palmeri of an infantry line of the Napoleonic era or one from the Colonial wars. He exhaled so that there was no air passing over his vocal cords when he talked into his headset. “Spray 'em,” he commanded the others. “Try to get as many as you can. Maybe it'll scare 'em back.”

  There were muffled sounds as the ISET sprayed the oncoming line of troops with their automatic machine pistols. The flash suppressors and silencers on their weapons all but eliminated the noise and flash of the muzzle bursts; the Iraqis never saw where the shots came from. More than two dozen fell, and the line hesitated.

  The seven men replaced magazines and rolled into new positions, still not visible to the soldiers approaching up the slight incline. Suddenly, a squad equipped with RPGs fired a volley in a pattern with each burst some thirty meters apart. Five or six rounds exploded close to four of the men. Each of them scurried on their bellies toward the nearest explosion, trying to reduce the odds of being hit by the next round.

  Palmeri switched on his helmet-mounted radio. “Picnic Base calling Watchdog,” he said as quietly as he could, and hoping that a friendly USAF or Navy aircraft somewhere in the area was listening.

  “This is Watchdog. I'm ten klicks from your finger-pointer. Advise.”

  “How close is the big bang? We're in a mess of trouble with a company of bad guys coming on strong,” The others continued to fire on the advancing Iraqis, but now ammunition was becoming an issue. They fired in short, well-aimed bursts. Whole squads fell dead and the Iraqis fell back, but only until their officers urged them on

  “Picnic Base… stand by.”

  Another volley of RPGs slammed into the hillside. Palmeri saw Sears and Maloof go down. Then Diberra and Fernandez were overrun. The ISET couldn't fire fast enough to stop the vastly superior numbers of Iraqis. A moment later, twenty meters to his right, the lieutenant saw Turner, grievously wounded, rise up from his concealed position and stumble toward his attackers, firing his MP-5 from the hip and then, when his ammunition ran out, tossing hand grenades. They cut him down, but not before he had taken eight or ten of them with him. Now, only Palmeri and the Brit were left.

  “Picnic Base… be advised that ETA for the firecracker is sixteen minutes. What can we do to help you while you're waiting,” the F-16 pilot asked.

  “There are only two of us left, and we have no smoke to mark our pos. If you can home on the UAV beacon, drop down low, you'll see the bad guys. They're coming at us like some Civil War infantry line. Can you lay down some fire and take out enough to make the odds a little more even?”

  “Picnic Base… Watchdog responding. Keep your head down; I'm coming in!”

  Seven seconds later the F-16 screamed out of the low hills to the north, releasing a GBU laser-guided bomb directly into the line of Iraqi troops. The fighter plane whooshed over Palmeri's head. The plane was so low that when it banked away, Palmeri could see the pilot's face.

  The F-16's wingman then made a pass and decimated another line of troops, by now scattering for cover.

  From his command post in hangar 3 at the abandoned air base, Kamil watched as the U.S. plane dove and sprayed his troops with devastation. He screamed at the nearest officer to bring some anti-aircraft weapons to bear. Meanwhile, the pilots for the two MI-27 HIND helicopters that would have been able to provide support for his Amn Al-Khass troops were nowhere to be found.

  After two passes each, the flight leader of the two F-16s called down to the ISET Echo base. “Picnic Base… this is Watchdog. Advise.”

  There was no answer. He climbed in a roaring, soaring arc to thirty-four thousand feet and tried again. “Picnic Base… give me your status. Please advise, Picnic Base.”

  Still no answer.

  The flight leader then broke away, did a tight turn five miles to the east of the contact, and came back at rooftop height. He aimed his video cameras at the site of the battle and zoomed in. The images were not very stable, but he knew where the ISET team was located. It had appeared to him that the two of them were either dead or wounded. And now…

  “Watchdog… we're all dead.” Palmeri's weak voice came through the pilot's headset. “The Brit took a grenade hit… and I… uh… I c-caught a couple rounds. I'm bleeding bad… won't make it… tell Picnic Leader… a grenade took out… took out the LTD. The laser's gone and I—” Palmeri stopped in midsentence, choking on his own blood.

  “Picnic Base… can you repeat?”

  All the pilot heard was static. He reported back to Newman aboard the MD-80 that his team and the laser-targeting device were lost. He flew north to rendezvous with the others.

  Aboard the MD-80

  ________________________________________

  28,000 feet, 20 miles E of Mosul, Iraq

  Monday, 6 March 1995

  1451 Hours, Local

  Newman had listened in helpless horror as the action took place 125 miles away. “How long to target?” he asked Charlie Haskell.

  He looked at the airspeed and ETA readout and responded, “Twenty-one minutes, sir.”

  Newman turned to McDade and asked, “Can the UAV still do some damage without the laser?”

  “Yes, sir. We know the GPS of the team… and the target. They're already programmed in. I think I can disable the instructions we gave it earlier, slow it down, and re-program it to follow guidance from here based on what we see from its onboard camera.”

  “Do it,” ordered Newman.

  While McDade worked out the instructions to the UAV, Newman thumbed his intercom switch. “Major Robinette, break off your course and head straight down the Tigris to Tikrit. I want to see the UAV hit the target.”

  “Roger that, sir.”

  “Everyone aboard,” Newman ordered into the intercom, “make sure your parachute harnesses are tight. You may need your chutes before this is over.”

  Robinette had no sooner made the turn back to the east than an alarm sounded both in the cockpit and on McDade's console.

  “It's an Iraqi radar and missile site,” said Haskell. “They've locked on.”

  Newman heard Robinette's voice on the air-to-air net. “Watchdog, this is Big Bird. I'm being painted by a target acquisition radar, over.”

  “Roger, Big Bird, we're on the way.”

  Seconds later an F-16 came whipping in from right to left across the front of the MD-80, talking to the other F-16 escorts. The fighter banked hard to the right in front of the MD-80, found the site, and locked on. A few seconds later, a guided missile blazed from beneath the fighter. The missile took out the site with an explosion the crew in the MD-80 could see from miles away.

  The alarm sounded again. Another Iraqi radar site was locking on to their aircraft. And another F-16 banked and dived, and another Iraqi site was destroyed.

  Five minutes later, as they approached the defensive zone surrounding Tikrit, three different Iraqi radar sites locked on to the plane. One site was destroyed right away, but since there were three different immediate threats, it required precious seconds for the F-16s to coordinate their response. A second site was destroyed before it could launch, but the third site had enough time to fire four missiles at the MD-80. Two F-16s streaked out in front and dived toward the oncoming weapons ready to use defensive armaments and missiles of their own.

  Two of the Iraqi rockets were destroyed while they were still almost thirty miles away, but the other two continued on their course toward the lumbering MD-80. One of the two was just under two minutes from their plane when an F-16 downed it, but its twin kept coming. Another F-16 released a Sidewinder missile and eliminated the incoming threat.

  On the flight
deck, there wasn't time for even a sigh of relief. More and more Iraqi radar sites were coming alive. Two F-16s took up defensive positions off the wings of the MD-80.

  Alarms sounded again. This time the threat was from a single site, an easy target for one of the F-16s.

  The MD-80 was approaching the 35th parallel, still some thirty-eight miles north of the target. McDade shouted, “I've got the Global Hawk under positive control. I'm getting imagery from its onboard camera and can make out the buildings on the palace grounds, but I don't know which one is which.”

  Newman jumped from his seat to look at the display on McDade's console. As he did so, he could hear the F-16 pilots talking to Major Robinette.

  “We're out of bullets, babe,” one of the fighter pilots said, “I recommend you break away now, 'cause if they shoot anything else, all we can throw at 'em is chaff.”

  Suddenly, the missile warning alarm sounded again. This time three other sites were coming alive. The Iraqi radar stations west of Tikrit, responsible for protecting Saddam's palace, had acquired the MD-80.

  “What do you want me to do, Colonel?” It was the voice of Major Robinette from the cockpit, calm and measured.

  “Can we hold this course for just a minute more while we get the UAV homing on its target? If they are paying attention to us heading at 'em from the north, maybe they won't be able to pick up the Global Hawk coming in from the west.”

  “Roger that,” replied Robinette, the sound of the alarms bleeding over her mike.

  “What are you guys doing?” It was one of the now-toothless F-16s.

  “We're going to hold this altitude and heading for another fifty seconds and then skeedaddle,” replied Robinette.

  There was a momentary silence on the radio and the intercom while Newman bent over McDade's video display and tried to pick out the right building on the palace grounds so McDade could put the cursor over it and hit “Enter,” for the UAV's memory. But before they could act, he heard one of the F-16 pilots: “SAM! SAM! SAM!”

  One of the fighters broke hard to the right and dived for the deck. But his companion, instead of following the prescribed SAM avoidance maneuver, continued on course, looking visually for the missile that had been fired at the two fighters and the ungainly MD-80.

  From the MD-80, the surface-to-air missile looked like a telephone pole riding a column of fire and smoke, racing toward them. The fighter pilot kicked in his afterburner and flew straight for the oncoming missile.

  “Oh, dear God,” said Haskell, “he's going to take the bullet for us.”

  They watched in horror as the F-16 purposely ran into the incoming missile about seven miles ahead of them. There was a huge fireball as the F-16 disintegrated. No ejection seat, no parachute. And then as they watched with a feeling of nausea in their guts, their eyes widened in sheer terror. Coming through the smoke and fiery wreckage was a second missile, still hurtling toward them. Major Robinette's voice came over the intercom, “He only got one! A second one's coming at us!”

  Haskell was frantically calling for the EA-6 or more F-16 support, but there was no answer. The oncoming SA-6 would strike them in less than thirty seconds.

  Robinette shouted into the intercom, “Gotta go, gang, sorry 'bout this. Hang on in back,” She pushed the nose of the passenger jet hard over and dived for the ground.

  Everyone but Newman was strapped down. They grimaced as the MD-80 pulled negative g's and tried to throw them against the ceiling. Newman, bent over McDade's console one second, was flat against the ceiling the next. It probably saved his life.

  When the Iraqi missile struck the MD-80, it ripped off the bottom of the plane. The ISET and McDade, strapped in their seats, disappeared in the conflagration. There was a gaping hole where the bottom of the cabin had been, and what was left of the fuselage was beginning to tumble. Out of the corner of his eye, through the cracked lens of his full-face oxygen mask, Newman could see a body, incinerated beyond recognition.

  Major Robinette was somehow crawling out of the cockpit, trying to make her way to either an emergency exit or the hole in the floor.

  As the aircraft did another 360-degree roll, Newman pushed himself off the ceiling and grabbed the injured pilot. In what seemed to his oxygen-starved brain like slow motion, the two of them tumbled out of the hole in the fuselage just as it was pointed toward the earth. Still clutching one another, they fell clear of the plunging wreckage. Just before he passed out, Newman jerked the d-ring of Robinette's parachute, then his own.

  Underground Pipeline Road

  ________________________________________

  Lake Tharthar, Iraq

  Monday, 6 March 1995

  1512 Hours, Local

  Eli Yusef Habib had hoped that he might reach the pumping station oasis on the Euphrates River by nightfall. He did not like to sleep in his truck on this stretch of deserted highway. There were robbers and Army deserters who would think nothing of slitting a throat for a little food and water, not to mention the truck.

  Nevertheless, when he stopped for his afternoon prayers and a bite to eat, he felt he needed to stay there, where he had stopped. “All right, gracious God. I will give myself over to Your protection as I sleep here tonight.”

  Habib stopped his truck alongside the road and offered his prayers outside, as was his preferred way. He always felt distracted by the smells and touch of his mechanical transportation. Outside, in the air, he felt closer to God. He could smell the humid scent of the lake just to the south and the faint fragrance of the few desert flower blossoms.

  Habib finished his prayers and stood to go back to the truck for some food and something to drink. The sound of aircraft high overhead caused him to look up just in time to see a huge fireball in the sky; many seconds later he heard the explosion.

  Perhaps they are having military maneuvers. That is probably why they had roadblocks set up near the air base.

  He was still looking at the burning wreckage falling from the sky when a second, larger fireball erupted—the sound was much louder. This time the explosion seemed much closer to where he stood. Habib suddenly feared that he was in the path of an attack. He had witnessed many such engagements from a distance during the 1990—91 war and in the years since. The Americans and his old friends the British were always flying their jets overhead. That's why he tried to avoid areas where Saddam had his military forces. They were the real targets, not an old man and his truck.

  As Habib watched, he strained his eyes to see two small, dark spots in the sky above the flaming wreckage falling to earth. Suddenly, first one and then the other object stopped in their fall, then began to fall again, but much more slowly. As he squinted, he saw that two parachutes had opened.

  He knew about parachutes. As a boy he had seen the Nazis jumping out of airplanes into the desert. It had been a frightening sight for a fourteen-year-old boy.

  Habib watched them drift lower. Most of the wreckage had already dropped into Lake Tharthar. He regretted he did not have a boat so he could row out and see if there were any survivors. He looked up again at the two parachutes. Unlike the German paratroopers he had witnessed in North Africa as a youth, one of these two, the smaller one, did not seem to be doing much to control the direction of descent.

  Habib looked at the wreckage splashing into the lake and wondered if there had been others aboard who had not managed to extricate themselves from the flaming hulk. The old man said a quick prayer for them. Then he looked back over his shoulder for the two parachutists—but he saw nothing. He said a prayer for them as well.

  Newman regained consciousness as he descended below ten thousand feet. He remembered the missile hitting the aircraft and the explosion and seeing the gaping hole in the bottom of the fuselage, but he couldn't immediately recall how he had gotten free of the wreckage.

  As he hung in the harness, he shifted his legs, moved his arms and feet and tested his shoulder muscles to feel if anything was broken or if he was injured. He smelled smoke and realize
d his jacket was smoldering. He beat at the spot with his hand. Beneath the charred leather, he could feel his arm was burned. He had no idea where his gloves went. His helmet face-protector was coated with oily soot, and he could hardly see. He rubbed it with the back of his hand and saw pieces of his skin stuck to the plastic. His hand was badly burned.

  Newman flipped up his face protector and felt the icy wind; the blast of cold air helped to revive him. He could see now, and looked all around him as the parachute drifted lower. He spied wreckage beside a large lake below him, but he could see no sign that McDade or any of his ISET team had escaped. He felt an awful sickness in his stomach as the reality of their deaths hit him. Two teams… everyone killed.

  He turned and looked around some more. Maybe he missed them; maybe they jumped earlier, he hoped. Then he saw the lake, and he was heading right toward it. He grabbed the harness and pulled the parachute lines to keep himself from sailing into the water. It wasn't the kind of high-performance parachute he'd become accustomed to while jumping in Force Recon, but the aerodynamic principles were the same.

  He let what little wind there was work for him. By creating a parasail effect he was able to maintain his rate of descent.

  “How do you do that?” a thin voice yelled at him. He turned and saw, slightly above him, another chute. It was Jane Robinette. He was glad she was alive. Newman yelled back at her, giving instructions on how to use the lines to guide her descent.

  Newman estimated that by turning into the wind and using the chute as a brake they could traverse at least a mile to the west and perhaps avoid the water altogether.

  As he looked at the expanse of Lake Tharthar, he saw bits of wreckage and what looked to him to be at least two bodies floating in the water some four hundred meters from the shore. From the looks of things, Newman guessed that only he and Robinette had gotten out of the flaming MD-80 alive.

  The ground was approaching quickly now, and Newman started looking for a landing site. He anticipated the impact and did a near-perfect landing fall, allowing his bent legs to take the initial shock and then rolling left onto his calf, thigh, hip, and shoulder. He quickly got up and collapsed the chute to keep it from dragging him along the rocky ground. As soon as he had unsnapped his harness, he looked around to see where Major Robinette had landed.