He closed his eyes and tried to call on his psychic resources to provide him some clue, some little shred of truth in the whole bloody mess. Suddenly he found himself staring into a pair of vacant eyes. They were so lacking in life they were nearly white. That’s when he realized they belonged to a ghost—the spirit of the Marine who had chosen to visit him in the foxhole back at Khe Sanh.
And what the ghost had told him then, suddenly made a lot of sense right now. Don’t make the same mistake again. Don’t go about the thing the wrong way. Get to the heart of the matter!
That’s when it hit him. Get to the heart of the matter!
He suddenly had a plan.
Chapter Forty-seven
The next day
EVEN AT THE HEIGHT of the Minx attack, the air base at Da Nang had not been as busy as this.
There were four C-5s lined up on the main runways—the trio of Football City Special Forces Galaxys plus Triple X. The Football City planes were packed with paratroops; Triple X was bristling with weapons copped from the defense perimeter around Da Nang air base.
The past twenty-four hours had been spent on the radio with the commanders of the various defense forces in other parts of South Vietnam. To a man, they confirmed what the Sky High Spies recon video had shown: every major city on the coast was under tremendous attack; every major city was on the verge of being overrun by the Minx.
In all of the conversations, the United American officers in Da Nang had one message to their besieged colleagues: Hang on. Help is on the way.
Now each of the Football City planes was heading for a paradrop over a separate location—one to New Saigon, one to Cam Ranh Bay and one to Quang Ngai. The insertion of the three hundred elite paratroopers at each of these key locations would help the desperate defenders hold on just a little longer.
By the same token, Triple X meanwhile was heading for Na Trang, where it would lend critically needed air support for the encircled mercenary troops there.
Behind the four Galaxys was the trio of F-20 Tiger-sharks, with Ben, Frost and JT at their controls. Their wings heavy with bombs, their cannons fresh with ammunition, the F-20s were heading for air strikes against smaller cities along the coast that had already been overrun by the Minx.
Waiting patiently at the end of this impressive line of aircraft was the SR-71 Blackbird. At its controls was Hawk Hunter.
Unlike the others, Hunter’s mission this fateful day was to gather intelligence—information that he needed if his latest in a series of bold plans was ever going to work.
He was piloting the Blackbird alone—the mission he was undertaking was much too risky to endanger the lives of the Kephart Brothers, although they both insisted that one of them should go along, at the very least to work the spy plane’s cameras.
But Hunter politely refused. All he asked for was use of their unique airplane, with a half-serious promise of full compensation if it was damaged or destroyed. Finally, they agreed.
At exactly 0700 hours, the Football City planes took off. Climbing slowly into the crystal clear morning sky, the gigantic airships formed up and slowly turned southward, their holds full of anxious, determined paratroopers.
Triple X was airborne a minute later, its fuselage absolutely bristling with weapons, from Gatlings up to light artillery pieces, shades of the old Bozo and Nozo gunships.
The F-20s went next. Their targets being hardened Minx positions, there was no need for them to carry anything other than big 1,000-pound GP bombs. Each Tigershark had four strapped to its wings.
Finally, it was Hunter’s turn.
He’d flown the SR-71 on several occasions back when he was helping the Brothers Kephart reconstruct it after it was found hidden away in a hangar in Old Mexico. It was a very unique airplane, to say the least. With its awesome power and climbing ability, it was quite capable of reaching the edge of space—thus the need for the bulky space-suit and helmet. It could also fly at three, or four, or even five times the speed of sound, depending on load and fuel capacity. This mind-boggling performance was due to both the SR-71’s pair of ramjet-adapted engines which Hunter and the Kepharts had souped up to 40,000 pounds of thrust each, and the airplane’s titanium body which was light, yet capable of handling the high temperatures of near-hypersonic speed.
Possibly the most unusual thing about the airplane—at least from Hunter’s present point of view—was that it was unarmed. The SR-71 couldn’t carry a bomb or a cannon, nor would its baroque design allow for any weapons’ adaptation.
No—the Blackbird sole weapon was its speed.
And that’s exactly what Hunter would need where he was going.
It began as a slow day for the radar operators at the Dong Ha air base.
Usually the radarmen would run a drill around dawn every morning, to keep their senses sharp as well as check out their sophisticated airborne early warning equipment.
But there was no drill today—the radarmen and the pilots and mechanics for the squadron of 18 MiG-25 Foxbats also stationed at the base were in the middle of a work stoppage. They hadn’t been paid in nearly two months now, and while their paymasters battled it out with the finance officers at Minx High Command in Hanoi, the base personnel had agreed not to perform any duty until the dispute was settled.
This was not the first time that High Command had screwed the men stationed at Dong Ha on their monthly payouts. Like many employers, the Viet Minx were long on demanding hard work and short on getting the checks in the mail. And everyone knew the reason for this latest indignation: with the big offensive now on in the south, CapCom was forcing the Minx High Command to concentrate its monetary resources there, and thereby stiffing its units in the north.
So there’d be little work done at Dong Ha today. Instead, the base personnel were gathered in the mess hall where a craps game was underway. Gambling was the common diversion whenever a pay dispute was happening at Dong Ha, though because there was a shortage of cash around the base, most of the players were betting with IOUs.
With the vast majority of the base personnel crowded into the mess hall, it was just a coincidence that one of the radar operators—a man named Vinh—just happened to be in the radar station when one of the air defense monitors began sounding its warning buzzer. He had gone to the station to retrieve a purse containing gold coins which he had hidden beneath one of the floor boards on the structure’s first floor. Barred from using IOUs because of payoff discrepancies in the past, Vinh needed to use his small gold reserve to get back into a hot game. So it was more out of curiosity than anything else that caused him to disengage the alarm and check the long-range radar screen. He saw a tiny blip had entered the radar net at coordinates which put it about forty miles east of Dong Ha.
Vinh studied the indication with slight but gathering interest. With so many disparate Minx units under the CapCom umbrella, violating air space and failing to request proper crossover rights were commonplace. But this blip was unlike anything he’d ever seen. It was barely visible, a faint blink of static moving right into the center of the radar net. This told Vinh that whatever kind of aircraft it was, it was moving incredibly fast and at an incredibly high altitude.
And heading on a course which would bring it right over Dong Ha itself.
Vinh made a quick notation into the log book, retrieved his gold purse and then walked out of the radar station. Staring up into the crystal clear morning sky, he squinted long enough to spot a very thin white contrail passing directly overhead. He studied the long trail of ice crystals and exhaust for a few moments; the aircraft leaving the wake was moving so fast, and was so high up, it was nearly invisible.
Vinh had to think for a moment. He couldn’t believe that this aircraft belonged to the Viet Minx or any of their allies.
Yet, what should he do about it? He was on strike.
Still, against his better judgment, he made a quick call to the next biggest Minx installation, the Long Dik railroad yards located about 55 miles to the west. He had
a brief conversation with a junior radio officer there, telling him that an unidentified aircraft would be passing over their position with a few minutes time, Vinh hung up quickly, not bothering to wait for a reply.
Then, gold purse in hand, he headed back toward the mess hall.
It took another five minutes for the contrail high above him to finally fade away.
Long Dik Railroad Yards
There was a small crowd outside the administration building in the middle of the huge railroad marshalling center when the unidentified aircraft streaked over.
Most of the observers—Minx soldiers and civilian railway workers—could just barely make out the dark object riding the sky ahead of the long stream of white smoke. Even those with high-powered binoculars had a hard time focusing on the fast-moving, high-flying dark blue shape. Just about everyone agreed they’d never seen anything like it before.
The Minx officers amongst the crowd were quick to point out that what ever the aircraft was, it certainly was part of the bulging Minx arsenal, probably a secret craft of some kind, bought by CapCom to assist in the big offensive in the south. Why else would it be heading straight for Hanoi, some forty-five miles away?
But as the object finally faded from view, several of the Minx officers slipped into the administration building and quickly called the Viet Minx High Command headquarters in the capital city. Their message: alert your air defense units immediately. An unidentified aircraft is heading your way. And it is moving very fast.
Hanoi
There were three separate air defense systems protecting the myriad of Minx military installations in and around the city of Hanoi.
The first was made up of an infamous weapon: the SA-2 surface-to-air missile. This telephone-pole-with-fins missile was responsible for downing hundreds of American warplanes during the last Vietnam War. Under orders from CapCom, the Viet Minx High Command had bought up every SA-2 SAM on the world’s burgeoning arms black market. Now there were literally hundreds of these weapons ringing the center of Hanoi in three concentric circles, the furthest being twenty miles out, the innermost placed around the city limits themselves.
The second line of air defense was made up of aircraft based at Xa Ho Ha air field, located on the southwestern edge of the city. The sprawling air base supported no less than seven squadrons of MiG-25 Foxbat jet fighters, each containing at least eighteen combat aircraft. But, as with many Minx units charged with protecting the capital city, six of the squadrons at Xa Ho Ha had been deployed south to fight in the Big Offensive. It was hoped that the remaining squadron would be adequate to provide air cover for the capital.
The third line of air defense was made up of thousands of antiaircraft artillery guns. These guns were everywhere the SAMs weren’t. They were located on just about every high building, hilltop and even in some trees, surrounding and within the city. These weapons were of all calibers and in many cases had radar-controlled aiming devices and time-fused, high-fragmentation shells. They were spread out all over Greater Hanoi, and were especially thick around high-priority Minx installations including the extensive barracks and troop processing center north of the city, the enormous communications facility off to the city’s west, and of course, the huge Xa Ho Ha air base.
But like many of the other Minx installations around Hanoi, a number of the AAA units were involved in a work stoppage. Some hadn’t been paid in as much as three months—the majority hadn’t received payouts for six weeks. The guns at these installations stood locked and sealed, their crews idle, their pay officers waiting in line at Minx High Command Headquarters to air their troops’ grievances.
One of the AAA units that was getting paid—proof that the High Command was selectively compensating some units—was the 4518th Aerial Battery Company. It was no coincidence that this AAA unit was based the furthest out from Hanoi. Its string of six gun sites twenty-two miles due east from the city limits served as a tripwire for the inner defense sites. If an aerial intruder was bent on entering Hanoi’s airspace from due east, they would be engaged by the 4518th Aerial Battery Company first.
It was 0900 hours when the 4518th got a hasty flash message directly from Minx High Command in Hanoi. They were to turn on their engagement radars and set them to the highest altitude possible. In most cases, this was 62,500 feet. They were told to look for anything flying near that altitude, possibly some kind of high speed jet or even an incoming missile.
But after three minutes of searching, the radar operators at the 4518th found nothing anywhere near that high altitude. When the Minx High Command was informed of this, they ordered the radar operators to search the skies around 40,000 to 45,000 feet. Again, after a few minutes of intense scanning, the radar operators could find nothing.
The third anxious flash message to the 4518th batteries ordered all of the gun crews out of their bunkers and to their gun posts. They were told to search the skies visually, at the same time loading their guns for possible action. Within seconds the highly trained, recently paid crews were pouring out of their revetments and manning their AAA weapons. Many were equipped with high-powered binoculars and they used these to scan all quadrants of the sky around them.
Still, they found nothing.
Not right away, anyway.
It was about twelve miles away, coming over the jungle due east of them, when the members of 4518th’s Battery #6 first spotted it. It was a huge aircraft, painted all black, with a long snout and strangely cranked wings. It was flying so low, the exhaust from its powerful engines was setting the tops of the trees on fire.
The crew at Battery #6 ably loaded their gun and prepared to fire. But the black jet was moving so fast and so low, it was on them even before they got their elevation down low enough to hit it. It roared overhead, so close to the ground, the searing exhaust made their uniforms smolder. The noise from its jets was so loud, it made their ears bleed. Several of the gunners began vomiting, the sudden assault on all their senses being so massive it caused an instantaneous, acute nausea.
And then, just like that, it was gone. Streaking over the western horizon like the angel of death vengefully looking for more victims—and heading right for Hanoi.
Hunter was sweating.
The leather straps holding his helmet to his chin were sopped with perspiration, shrinking the leather and causing it to tighten around his neck. The sweat was running so freely inside his spacesuit, it was seeping through his speed-johns and soaking his skin beneath. Even his hands were wet with perspiration, running down his wrists and into his leather flight gloves. The only part of his body to remain relatively dry were his feet.
It was not anxiety or fear or even apprehension which had soaked Hunter through. Rather it started with the eyeball-busting plunge he had made from 65,000 feet to just 150 feet off the ground in less than 45 seconds. The heat built up in the dizzying dive men combined with the heat generated by air resistance in the sluggish atmosphere so close to the earth. This caused the temperature inside the SR-71’s cockpit to soar to 110 degrees, with no sign of letting up.
But Hunter didn’t mind the discomfort. It was necessary if he was to complete this rather feverish mission. The plunge from twelve miles up had been necessary: he knew that Minx air defense systems would be searching for him at high altitude as soon as he passed over Dong Ha and Long Dik. This meant he had to get down on the deck so quick, they wouldn’t have time to react, and thus allow him to complete his recon run relatively unhindered.
He saw the outline of the city of Hanoi ahead of him now. It looked as dreary and monolithic as he had been led to believe. At seven miles out, he banked to his right, and soon found himself roaring over a number of truck parks packed with military vehicles. Beyond these marshalling areas, he came upon a vast barracks and troop processing area.
A bank to the left found him just fifty feet above an enormous farm of satellite dishes and microwave antennas servicing a large communications complex located nearby.
A further turn to the
left and he was able to skirt the far edge of the huge Xa Ha Ho air base. He could tell by the recent tiremarks on the base’s main runway that a number of aircraft had taken off recently but had not returned. Hunter correctly guessed that these planes had been redeployed south to take part in the big Minx offensive.
But it was only when he banked thirty degrees to the left again when he began the cameras inside his nonsecone to whirring. Set on sideways angle fix, all six cameras captured, with reassuring mechanical efficiency, footage of the interior of Hanoi city itself, precisely the intelligence Hunter needed.
It took all of fifteen seconds, and when it was over, Hunter couldn’t help but smile with the knowledge that he had gotten what he came for.
As he streaked out over Hanoi’s city limits, he shut down the cameras and then put the SR-71 into a bone-crunching climb, rocketing straight up until he was out of sight from the ground.
He was passing through 65,000 feet in less than forty-five seconds. It was now imperative that he get back to Da Nang as quickly as possible. He had to send an urgent message to General Jones in Washington, requesting that he track down two individuals back in America who held the key to the ultimate success of Hunter’s idea. At that moment, finding these two men was the most important thing in the world.
Leveling off at 70,000 feet, The Wingman buried the throttles of the big spy plane. The two ramjets exploding in a burst of pure hypersonic power, he turned south and headed for home.
Chapter Forty-eight
Boston
24 hours later
THE BLUE, HEAVILY ARMED Huey helicopter touched down at what was once known as Logan International Airport.
No sooner had it landed when six soldiers of the First American Airborne Division jumped out, their M-16s at the ready. Behind them a lone, smaller figure, was easing out of the chopper’s passenger bay with a minimum of dramatic flair.
Ghost War Page 34